Chelsea 2 Arsenal 1HERE WAS the Premier League season in miniature for these clubs, with Chelsea doggedly clambering upwards and Arsenal taking a tumble just when it looked as if they had a secure footing with the opening goal. The departure from normality lay in the radical effect that Avram Grant had. If his substitutions had to be deplored when Chelsea slithered to a 4-4 draw at Tottenham then the changes he made yesterday must be applauded.

Juliano Belletti and Nicolas Anelka came on to contribute to the winner, the second of Didier Drogba's goals. The chants of "You don't know what you're doing" from his own fans when that pair were introduced to address the 1-0 deficit reflected the lack of confidence in the Grant regime, but no one is clear about Chelsea's actual worth nowadays.

There are rational causes for gladness around Stamford Bridge now that a fixture with a major rival has finally been won by the Israeli. What is more, Chelsea have overtaken Arsenal to stand second in the table, five points behind the leaders Manchester United, whom they have still to meet on this ground.

The overall situation will please Alex Ferguson and the Old Trafford squad but Chelsea are at least putting up a fight. They will be particularly capable of making heads ring if Drogba can go on landing blows as he did here. The Ivorian must be infuriating to Stamford Bridge devotees, since it sometimes feels as if he had no sooner set down his pen after signing for the club than the tales of his disaffection began to spread.

He was fully engaged yesterday, particularly after the interval. Arsenal were unlucky since Drogba should have been given offside in the build-up to the equaliser as the ball was launched through the middle. But Arsene Wenger's team began to reel from the moment they opened the scoring. That goal from the right-back Bacary Sagna exposed Chelsea's deficiencies at set-pieces, just as Tottenham had done.

The Frenchman broke away from Salomon Kalou and got in front of Frank Lampard to head in a Cesc Fabregas corner from an acute angle at the near post in the 59th minute. Before long, Sagna hurt an ankle and he eventually had to be replaced, a factor that Wenger blamed, in part, for the outbreak of confusion in his back four. As Wenger knows, of course, his squad have to be far more resilient than this in adversity.

Arsenal have improved this season, but it now looks like the early stage of a revival. In future, a larger squad will be essential and so, too, will be an enhanced hardiness because brittleness has become apparent over the pounding of the long Premier League programme. A five-point lead has, in mercurial fashion, been converted into a six-point deficit.

Arsenal's showing yesterday was good enough for a period to suggest that the club, who had been the last to beat Chelsea on the Premier League here in February 2004, would repeat the feat. They had looked enterprising even before they scored, with Mathieu Flamini, for instance, seeing a raking drive blocked by the goalkeeper Carlo Cudicini after 47 minutes.

Chelsea, by and large, had been toiling. The exasperation would have peaked when Kalou, with an opportunity at last, had a fresh-air shot just before the interval. In retrospect it is not too difficult to explain the downfall of Arsenal that lay ahead. Direct football was productive and it took no more than a clearance from John Terry for Drogba to tear through, only for the ball to bounce off his knee as he raced towards Manuel Almunia.

With 17 minutes to go, the striker was initially offside. Permitted to proceed, Drogba pushed a pass towards Lampard and when possession came back to him he shot home confidently, past the left hand of Almunia.

The winner, eight minutes from the close, saw Belletti clip a free-kick and Anelka nod it into the centre for an unmarked Drogba to fire into the net.

There might have been a hat-trick for the striker but Almunia made an excellent save after Belletti had pulled a cut-back to him. This victory contained traces of the old Chelsea in the steadfastness shown in a moment of crisis. In addition to seeing Arsenal move in front they also had to put up with handicaps, such as the hip injury that hampered Lampard.

It is much too soon to declare that a fresh phase of Chelsea ascendancy is in the making. Grant, overall, has deserved this breathing space. Chelsea's consistency against the lesser teams was not to be sniffed at since other clubs have found it elusive. Now, too, Grant has taken a prize scalp in the Premier League. With United due here on April 26th, Chelsea remain firmly in the title race.