Chelsea and Arsenal notched impressive 6-0 victories Saturday as the champions destroyed Wigan Athletic and Arsene Wenger's team brought 10-man Blackpool crashing back to Premier League reality. Nicolas Anelka and Salomon Kalou netted twice as Chelsea, which opened the season with a 6-0 win over West Bromwich Albion last week. Theo Walcott was Arsenal's hero, scoring a hat trick in his best all-round performance for years while Blackpool paid a heavy price for having defender Ian Evatt sent off after 31 minutes. Gareth Bale hit two goals, the second a brilliant top-corner volley from a tough angle, as Tottenham Hotspur won 2-1 at Stoke City. In other games Bolton Wanderers won 3-1 at West Ham United, Birmingham City beat Blackburn Rovers 2-1 and promoted West Bromwich Albion edged Sunderland 1-0. Everton were held 1-1 at home by Wolverhampton Wanderers. When promoted Blackpool beat Wigan in its first game in the top flight for almost 40 years last week it was 3-0 up by halftime but at the Emirates it trailed by the same score at the break and was a man down. Arsenal took the lead after 12 minutes with a nicely-worked Walcott goal and Blackpool's slim hopes disappeared when center back Evatt was sent off for fouling Chamakh. Andrei Arshavin converted the resulting penalty to make it 2-0, Walcott then spun past his marker to bang his second and Abou Diaby rattled in the fourth just after the restart. Walcott, a surprise omission from England's World Cup squad in June, then produced a dazzling goal when he controlled a Diaby pass, ghosted forward and curled in a precise shot before leaving the field to a standing ovation. New signing Marouane Chamakh completed the thrashing with his first goal for the club seven minutes from time. Though Chelsea trounced Wigan 8-0 in May it had lost the away fixture to Roberto Martinez's team earlier in the season and it also looked second-best for the opening half hour on Saturday. However, when Florent Malouda tapped in the rebound after keeper Chris Kirkland blocked a 34th-minute Frank Lampard shot, everything changed. Two goals in five minutes early in the second half made sure of the points as Anelka ran on to a John Obi Mikel pass to shoot low past Kirkland and the Frenchman headed in a Didier Drogba cross. Drogba was the provider again for the next two as Kalou scored after 78 and 90 minutes while new signing Yossi Benayoun rounded things off in stoppage time. Hoffenheim routs Bremen Hoffenheim fought back from conceding an early goal, scoring four times in 23 minutes to crush Werder Bremen 4-1 in an impressive display of attacking football on Saturday. On Friday, champions Bayern Munich needed a stoppage-time goal from Bastian Schweinsteiger to beat VfL Wolfsburg 2-1. Elsewhere it was a perfect start for promoted Kaiserslautern and St. Pauli who recorded 3-1 wins at Cologne and Freiburg respectively. Hanover 96 put its first-round German Cup exit last week behind them to edge past Eintracht Frankfurt 2-1. Ruud van Nistelrooy scored twice to give Hamburger SV a winning start to its Bundesliga campaign with a 2-1 victory over 10-man Schalke. Van Nistelrooy scored with a spectacular volley in the 46th minute. But Jefferson Farfan pulled one back for Schalke, last season's runner-up, in the 80th before Van Nistelrooy secured the victory three minutes later.
