We came from behind to beat Chelsea 2-1 at the Emirates, and for the first time this season we had to win a game that was genuinely in the balance. Kai Havertz and Martin Odegaard overturned a Morgan Rogers goal scored inside 77 seconds, and a fourth straight win keeps us level with Manchester City at the top on a perfect record. This was the first real heavyweight fixture of the campaign, and it was comfortably the best game we have been involved in so far.

It also cost us our clean-sheet record and exposed, for the first time, that this team can be got at. Rogers' goal was the first we have conceded all season, and Chelsea created enough after it to have taken something from the day. Xabi Alonso has built a side that is thrilling going forward and loose at the back, and for an hour they gave us the sternest examination anyone has managed. We passed it. The margin was one goal and a post, and that is worth being honest about.

The start was a shock. Inside 77 seconds we failed to clear a Reece James free kick, the ball dropped to Morgan Rogers on the edge of the box, and he volleyed it beyond David Raya into the bottom corner. Rogers, a player we pursued in the summer window, scoring against the club that wanted him inside two minutes is the kind of subplot that stings twice.

The response was immediate and it was furious. We thought we had levelled on 12 minutes when a Declan Rice free kick caused a scramble and Riccardo Calafiori bundled in, but VAR ruled it out for an Ezri Konsa offside in the build-up. Emiliano Martinez, back at a London ground against a club tied to his past, denied Saka soon after. The equaliser finally arrived on 25 minutes through Kai Havertz, haunting his former club once again. The pressure had been relentless, and the goal was the least our first-half dominance deserved, even if Pedro Neto struck the base of the post right before the break to remind us how fine the margin still was.

The winner, five minutes after the restart, was the pick of the game. Christos Tzolis, found on the left, ghosted inside and slid a clever pass into the area. Havertz, back to goal, produced a superb dummy to let the ball run through his legs, and Odegaard, timing a late burst into the box, finished first time from close range. It was our captain's goal and his fine early-season scoring form continuing, and it was a sequence of real quality: Tzolis' vision, Havertz's dummy, Odegaard's run, all in one move. That is the football we are capable of when the pieces click.

They deserved more than nothing, and they got exactly that, which is the story of the last half hour. Chelsea's front three of Cole Palmer, Joao Pedro and Rogers carried a threat all afternoon, and Alonso's side had significant spells of possession after Odegaard's goal without quite finding the equaliser. Raya, who may have been slow to get down for the Rogers volley, redeemed himself late by tipping an Estevao effort over the bar, and Martinez and Raya traded big saves as the game opened up.

This is the part that matters for the season rather than the afternoon. Chelsea have lost their last five at the Emirates now, but this was nothing like the previous four, which we won by an aggregate of 11-2. They examined our defence in a way Coventry and Villa could not, and they found that when the front line is this good, we can be pulled out of shape. We won because Odegaard and Havertz have a chemistry that produces goals like the winner, and because Raya made the save when it counted. We did not win because we controlled the game from front to back. Against a side with title pretensions of their own, that is a useful thing to have learned in a game we still took all three points from.

Four wins from four, top of the league with City, and the first genuine test of the season passed. Napoli away in the Champions League next, and then Sunderland, but this was the afternoon that told us most: this team can win the hard ones, and it can also be hurt. Both were true at the Emirates, and both are worth carrying forward.