- Arsenal’s injuries ahead of the league cup final
- Arsenal v Manchester City and a referee with an “interesting” view of fouls and cards
By Tony Attwood
There is a general view in the media that Arsenal need to win the League Cup because Arteta has only won one trophy with Arsenal – the FA Cup, but has come second in the league three times running.
Yet this is simply another “Arsenal are desperate” approach, aimed, I’m sure, at making Arsenal fans, and anyone in the club silly enough to read the papers, nervous.
These articles are always full of “will be” statements, as in “Arsenal will be nervous because….” but of course there is no evidence for this. In fact, what evidence there is suggests that Arsenal should be nerve-free, in that they are still in four competitions, which in itself is a remarkable achievement.
Indeed, coming second in the league three seasons running when up against a team that was built on utterly unrestrained purchasing power is a phenomenal achievement, which, of course, the media, who remain beholden to ManC, cannot acknowledge.
And then we have the notion thrown in that Arsenal will inevitably slip back in terms of points per game in the weeks to come, so this is their BIG CHANCE before that slippage happens. It’s a clever tale and generally (although to be fair, not always) promoted with some data to back this up such as the points gained before and after the League Cup final.
But in fact articles of this nature are simply a load of twaddle as in fact, in the last four seasons, two of the winners of the League Cup have then followed that victory with a dip in form, but the other two have taken the victory as a stepping stone to an improved set of performances in the league. So in 2021/2 Liverpool went into the League Cup final having 2.31 points per game in the league up to that point. They then got 2.67 points per game in the 12 games left at the end of the season.
Then again, last season, Newcastle United approached the game with 1.68 points per match before that event, but then, having won the Cup, across their remaining ten games, gained 1.9 points per match.
Now, it is true that in the other two of the last four seasons, the points per game gained by the winning team went down, which shows that there is no pattern. Some clubs take a League Cup victory as a stepping stone to further success, others take it as the completion of a successful season, and then relax, and the club slides backwards. I guess it depends on the manager.
One of the big advantages Arsenal have, however, is that the media has been so negative about them this season that the scribblers don’t have much ammunition left in their arsenal. As it were. They’ve pretty well thrown everything at Arsenal that they can, and it is more than likely that anything written in recent papers will not affect the players or manager at all. Everyone will know, this is what you get when you are Arsenal.
Raya
Timber Saliba Gabriel Calafiori
Rice Zubamendi Eze
Saka Gyokeres Trossard
The Metro also tells us that “Alan Shearer has backed Arsenal to end their long wait for silverware by beating Manchester City in today’s eagerly anticipated Carabao Cup final.”
Sports Mole as usual, has their most detailed analysis of the forthcoming game, and it ends with the prediction of a team that is just a little different from above…
Kepa;
Timber, Saliba, Gabriel, Hincapie;
Zubimendi, Rice; Saka,
Eze, Trossard; Gyokeres
And just one more. Football London gives us
Raya;
Timber, Saliba, Gabriel, Hincapie;
Zubimendi, Rice, Eze;
Saka, Gyokeres, Trossard
So there we are. The first of our four possible trophies this season reaches the final stage. And there is a little bit of recuperation time before the next match which is… the FA Cup quarter final away to Southampton on Saturday 4 April at 8pm. And then after that… well no, I don’t know about the players, but I am not sure I can cope with all of this…
- Arsenal v Manchester City: how the two clubs have been doing of late
- How far is the war in the middle east affecting Machester City?
