Morning all.
I thought I’d be a nervous wreck pre yesterday’s final but weirdly, that wasn’t the case. The news that Jurrien Timber and Eb Eze weren’t in the squad dampened my mood somewhat. Not that I didn’t have faith in Ben White and Kai Havertz of course but Eze has been in fine form of late, Havertz, well, I still don’t think he is fully fit.
I’m not going to go over the game because what’s the point, we all watched it I’m sure. Our first golden opportunity fell at the feet of our German but he couldn’t make it count. We had other chances too during that first half albeit few and far between but just like the opportunity to win silverware, they went begging. With Piero Hincapie on a yellow card for nothing, Semenyo was getting the better of him.
I thought Mikel Arteta would change things at halftime, just as I thought Arsenal would come out and show a bit more mettle after a team talk but exactly the opposite unfolded. We were poor. We were passive and we totally lost control of the game as we dropped deeper and deeper, allowing City to drop into training mode. Yes, that’s how it looked.
When Kepa allowed a soft ball to squeeze through his hands, gifting City their opening goal in the process, the writing was on the wall. When Mikel Arteta finally made changes, we perked up a bit. Riccardo Calafiori was certainly doing his best to find a goal and had Leandro Trossard been a bit quicker, he might have got his boot on the end of a shot from the Italian which went centimetres wide.
When it’s said that football is a game of two halves, yesterday couldn’t have been a better example of that phrase. Hindsight will tell us that David Raya would have been a better option in goal and on current form, it’s hard to argue otherwise but hindsight is a wonderful thing. Kepa hadn’t put a foot wrong through the knockout stages and let’s not forget the penalty save he made against Crystal Palace. I’m disappointed we lost the game yesterday but I’m more disappointed with manner in which we lost.
If that second half performance was a sign of how the players react to pressure, then Lord help us as we try to negotiate our way to a Premier League title. However, if Arteta, his staff and the players use the defeat to spur them onto success then maybe, just maybe, it’ll prove to be a blessing in disguise.
Yes, that’s the only positive I can come up with this morning. We might be down, but as yet, we’re far from out of three other competitions.
Catch up in the comments.