Arsenal fell 2-0 to Manchester City in the Carabao Cup final. It stinks to miss a chance at silverware, but it’s really hard for me to get too worked up about this one. The absences of both Martin Ødegaard and Ebere Eze were acutely felt and the difference in quality between backup keepers shone through. You’ve got to question Mikel Arteta’s substitution patterns, too. And the League Cup just isn’t the competition for the Gunners. Arsenal have lost seven finals, the most of any club.
There is no way
to analyze or dissect this match without first addressing Kepa’s mistake, unfortunately. His error was a game-changing one. Manchester City had plenty of pressure to start the second half, but without that mistake, they don’t score. Arsenal’s defense was bending, but it wasn’t breaking. City had the ball in good areas, but the defending matched their effort with tackles and blocks. I don’t think they managed a shot on target before Kepa spilled the ball to gift Nico O’Reilly a goal.
Arsenal couldn’t find a way out of the back in the minutes leading up to the goal. They’d clear the ball, it wouldn’t stick, and it would come right back. Some of that is on Viktor Gyokeres and Kai Havertz’s inability to win those battles but some of it is on not having any of Ødegaard, Eze, or even Mikel Merino on the pitch to settle things down. There wasn’t anybody in the middle of the field to find space to receive a pass after winning the ball back, hold onto it for a touch or two, and pick out a teammate to retain possession.
I’d bet some of that is on Kepa, too. Maybe not in those minutes of City pressure, but more generally, his reluctance / inability to make that line-breaking pass through City’s first line of four really hamstrung Arsenal’s ability to progress the ball. Anecdotally, it also felt as if his teammates weren’t as comfortable playing the ball back to him nor was he getting into the same positions that David Raya takes up to receive the ball, help break pressure, and start play the other way. It was a really bad combo!
Conceding the opening goal on an error is always a gut punch and Arsenal did not respond to it at all. A lot of that is on Mikel Arteta. He needed to make subs before play restarted. Changes would have given the side an extra beat to regroup mentally and the fresh legs might have helped relieve some of the pressure. But the players have to respond better of their own accord, too. They have to be able to shake it off and punch back. Instead, the ball came right back down the Arsenal end and it was 2-0, match over, before you had time to blink.
If Mikel Arteta had promised Kepa that he was going to start all the cup matches and he decided to keep his promise, it is what it is. I don’t think you can reasonably too upset about it, if that’s is why he played. But there is no escaping the fact that James Trafford, Manchester City’s backup, made a flurry of strong saves in the opening minutes of the match when Arsenal were dominating, and the Arsenal backup was directly and more or less solely responsible for the opening goal.
Arsenal will regret not making more of the opening 20-30 minutes of the match when they were firmly in control. The traffic was as one-way in Arsenal’s favor to start the game as it was the other way round to close out the half and start the second. And call me a broken record, but I think Manchester City got a massive assist from the referee to get themselves into the match.
You knew it was coming too, even when Arsenal were in control. The first two fouls of the game were ticky-tack ones where City went to ground really easily. A few minutes later, Viktor Gyokeres was left on his backside looking for a call that didn’t come. Bukayo Saka was taken out from behind twice in the opening 20 minutes on the ball and smashed into late from the blind side by Jeremy Doku. I lost count of how many fouls Bernardo Silva committed, including two where it was clear he targeted and took out an Arsenal player with no intent whatsoever to play the ball.
As if like clockwork, the only yellow card shown in the first half went to Piero Hincapie on a collision that was, at the very least, no worse than any of the ones Arsenal players suffered. I can maybe understand why it was shown — in live action, it looked like he caught the City player on the foot / ankle. Unfortunately, the replay revealed that if there was any contact foot-to-foot (or ankle) it was a glancing blow, significantly embellished to con the referee. And he fell for it. It was a foul, a defender colliding with a guy on the ball, but nothing more than that.
It had an outsized effect on the game, though. It’s no coincidence that Manchester City were suddenly better able to escape the Arsenal pressure. Hincapie couldn’t push up as aggressively on a yellow card and everyone else had to throttle back a bit to avoid exposing the fullback. There was one instance in particular that I remember where you could see Hincapie’s thought process in real time — he went to get close from an off angle, realized that he couldn’t make the challenge because of the yellow, and pulled out, allowing City to get away with the ball. All of a sudden, Jeremy Doku seemed to be on the ball with time and space every time you looked up. That’s not a coincidence!
Those types of decisions add up. Don’t you think Arsenal might have been more able to keep the pressure up had any of the Manchester City players been booked for similar (worse) fouls they committed and had to fall off in the same way? Probably. Heck, Manchester City’s 5-minute spell of possession in the final third to close out the first half came directly from Nathan Ake grabbing Bukayo Saka from behind with two hands and throwing him aside to win the ball. They don’t win a corner, get bodies forward, and pin the Gunners back but for an uncalled foul to gain possession. I don’t think the referee was the salient difference in the match, but he had a bad day, and the imbalance certainly didn’t help things on Arsenal’s side of the ledger.
As Arsene Wenger once said, “we were not very good and the referee was on our level.” That describes the last 60ish minutes of this match perfectly. Arsenal were on top to start things off but didn’t make anything of it. Then when things swung the other way, they didn’t respond. There were far too many passengers / poor showings.
Leandro Trossard was anonymous, once again. He’s been off the pace for going on two months. Bukayo Saka struggled to make an impact, continuing his down year. Ben White wasn’t up for it, perhaps he is still not at full fitness or maybe he doesn’t have enough anymore. Martin Zubimendi has been running on fumes for weeks.
Combine those off days with the key absences and a poor showing from the backup keeper and you’ve explained what happened nearly perfectly. There’s not much to take away from today’s match beyond that. Barring injury (which would be a disaster) David Raya will start from here on in. Martin Ødegaard should be back after the international break. Ebere Eze is not going away with England and is set for another scan on his calf in about a week, which is worrying, but Mikel Arteta didn’t offer more detail than that so all we can do is cross our fingers and hope. The Gunners need this international break to rest and regroup.
The perfect (shit)storm that was today’s match shouldn’t happen again. It stinks that those winds had to blow up for a cup final. Hopefully the side use today as fuel for the rest of the way.
