It isn’t only the Carling Cup, it isn’t only Birmingham. It is a cup final, our first since 2007 and a chance for a first trophy since 2005. The FA Cup victory seems a long, long time ago.
This is the first final preview type blog I have ever done since starting and the magnitude of this game is something I can’t stress enough. A few days ago the talk was all about beating Barcelona and how it was a humongous result for this team, however, a win tomorrow would put even that performance in the shade.
We have waited so long for this chance that we can’t afford to waste it, cup finals don’t grow on trees and in our last two we have came up against two fantastic teams in Barcelona and Chelsea – this time with all due respect to Birmingham, we are by far the favourites and it would be an upset of gargantuan proportions if the worst happens. It could quite possibly derail what could be a very special season indeed.
That is why this game is Arsene’s biggest.
The Champions League Final is not even close, to win that it would have been an exceptional achievement but we had had success not all that long before, and were possibly still riding on the coat-tails of the invincible. Arsene has never had to teach a team to win before, and if Arsenal win tomorrow he can claim he has done that; developing, nurturing, and most importantly, winning.
When Arsenal won the league and FA Cup in 1998 it was his, and Arsenal’s arrival, that was being shouted from the roof tops. Those two games were still not his biggest though, it wasn’t a young team who had had limited success as this one had. They were also two games where the captain, a winner, was present. Here, Cesc Fabregas – a World Cup and European Cup winner- won’t be.
Players will have to step up again, the days leader Robin van Persie, the magical Samir Nasri and – despite what people say – the world class Andrey Arshavin will be called upon to kick this season into life.
As we have so often seen in this part of the season, we start to flag a little bit, things go against the team and there is no lift. Tomorrow we can do just that, Wenger can cross another trophy off his checklist and it will be one almighty boot up the backside for this team. They will then know they can win things, proper things. We are not just talking the Emirates Cup here.
There are so many contributory stories to this. Eduardo had his leg broken against Birmingham and unsurprisingly the ‘do it for Eduardo’ campaign has been given another airing. I loved Eduardo the lack of a recovery to his peak at Arsenal was sad. My point here is that the final is not about Cesc, Wenger or Eduardo – it is for Arsenal. Wenger can make it a great day, Cesc could have helped make it a great day – Eduardo provides the tragedy in the tale – sadly. It is for Arsenal first, Wenger second, Cesc and the players third – then for the justice, like Eduardo.
There have been a fair few nervous twitches since the win over Stoke and I am not talking about Cesc’s hamstring – Arsenal are being bigged up to end their drought in a way that this squad probably hasn’t really had to face at all. It is one pressure starting a season having not won anything for a long time, it is another pressure entirely to deal with it over a 90 minute game. There will be nerves but hopefully they won’t lead to mistakes, that would be the most painful thing of all, our defence creaking when it has looked solid for months.
The nerves are already jangling, this is the cup final feeling and it has been away for far too long.
Welcome back.
Now to bring that winning feeling with it.
Damn, still 24 hours to go. Onto the next one…
Rubbish article.
It’s the Carling Cup for crying out loud! Yes, winning it is important, it will be great for confidence and give a fillip to the rest of the season but it is not in anyway Wenger’s biggest game as Arsenal manager, no thinking Arsenal fan would say such a thing… it’s not even Arsenal’s biggest game this month much less this season! Barca at home was an infinitely bigger game! Chelsea at home was a much, much bigger game given that blogs like yours said that Arsenal and Wenger were mediocre and had no hope at the start of the season. ManCity away was bigger given that Blogs like yours were going on about not winning against the big boys… What a load of hyperbolic nonsense.
Jacob, you are rubbish.
What Martin is trying to highlight is the significance of this final on the rest of our season as well as “Project Youth”. This final is not just about winning a trophy, it is about building the players’ confidence ahead of the final run in. If we do not win this final tomorrow, it could be a major blow to the club. Win it, and it could be the start of something really special. The team will finally know that they can win a trophy, which could spur them to even greater heights when we visit the Nou Camp and possibly Old Trafford within the next 2 weeks. This is why it is one of the biggest games in Arsene’s career (can’t think of a bigger one at the moment bar the CL final in Paris in 2006).
Whisper it quietly “a quadruple or treble” may be on the horizon.
The games you highlighted (Barcelona, Chelsea, Man City) did little more than shut up the doubters in the media and elsewhere (but also gave the team some belief). The key thing is nothing was won after those games. Those victories will all be quickly forgotten if we do not win tomorrow’s final, simple as that.
Go Gunners
Sorry mate, I don’t care what he is trying to say because he has simply not succeeded in saying it …
This game is most definitely NOT the biggest game Arsene has faced as manager of Arsenal. End of. It is not a credible, sensible or even an intelligent thing for any Arsenal fan to say, not if they know anything about football. The Carling Cup is the lowest trophy an English professional football team can win, Wenger has won League titles, we’ve beaten the best team in world recently and we’re second in the league… the Carling cup final is important but it is just silly to call it the biggest game of Wenger’s Arsenal career when it isn’t even the biggest game of the fortnight!…. In fact it is nonsense to say such a thing.
As for shutting up doubters… this blog has been not only one of leading doubters but one of the most doom laden. So you are right to say that the wins against City, Chelsea and Barca did shut up a fair few folk, it’s pity it included the Goon blog included. Ta.
jacob, obviously you are not a Arsenal fan. Yes, chelsea and barca were huge game, but do u know how important this cup is. I believe Martin’s concept of “Biggest game” means its the game that would end our trophy drought.
i agree with both, theres n oway it iswengers biggest game…. i lgo through some, champions league final, any barca game last couple of years, chelsea recently, city, united coming up at home, 2005 fa cup.. endless list. but its huge cos we need these players to win, they need that feeling and for this season it coulod be make or break… everything or nothing so yeah its massive…
but not the biggest
Without doubt, this is the most important game that Arsene has had as manager.
Win it, and it gives the team and fans the belief to go on to further glory; lose it, and suddenly all the questions will be there again. The press, the fans, and more importantly, the players themselves, will start to question whether they do have the bottle to win anything.
As a game it may not seem important, but as a statement of intent, it is massive to the progression of this Arsenal team.
To do it against a team that plays a style of football that we have struggled against in recent years, with a ref who has a percieved bias against us, and without our captain, would have an enormous psychological effect for the rest of the season.
We are The Arsenal, we should expect to compete, not just participate, in every competition that we enter each season. This year, for the first time in a long while, we are actually doing that.
At times we’ve been shoddy and inconsistent, ragged and unprofessional, but at other times, we’ve been magical and unplayable. Now we need to show that we have the balls to cross the finish line.
Do it for the Bear!
nonsense. win this and we could win nothing else. lose this and we could still win the treble. nonsense.
I agree with Jacob. It’s very typical tabloidy nonsense from this blogger. The only surprise is that anyone expects better
I’m sorry what a crock of shit yes it will give these players a boost and a needed one but to even compare a carling cup final against Brum to a champions league final against barca is laughable.
It is one of the most important games for Arsene but not THE most important game. Winning would bring enormous belief for winning trophies in the near future but losing would be a very hard pill to swallow simply because the opponent is Birmingham.It would seed an idea in the players’ minds that if we are not able to beat Birmingham what are we going to do competing against Maunre chelski and co. But I am confident that we would win tomorrow because we are extremely hungry and focussed going by our recent form.
What we need tomorrow is an early goal to settle the nerves and it would also make them come out and play creating space for us and everyone knows what we can do when provided with space. Wembley has a large pitch it would be very difficult for them to contain us. I am tipping Jack to have a great game tomorrow
Not a rubbish article as in many ways this was our biggest game for quite sometime and we fucked it up,totally dejected tonight and cant see us winning anything this season now.Although the truth is we have rotten luck in these cup finals as thats 3 in a row we have lost and 5 league cup final defeats in a row.I just knew when martins came on that he would score as he is one of those players that scores against us going back to his inter and geordie days.Walcott and cescs absenses cost us also and goodluck arsene getting this lot up after that.2005 and the wait continues but what about it as we play good footie isnt that right.
Bad bad night! I hope this doesn’t screw my week, or even month! Feel for the lads… Birmingham deserved it just as much as we did. But I HATE the way we handed it to them on a gold platter!
We got what we deserved. Birmingham wanted it more. Yet again we turned up complacent and made defensive howlers. I don’t care what wenger says the team is mentally weak. A couple of players are quite tough mentally but there are way too many passengers.
I do not know what rosicky contributes. No way is he deserving of a cup final start. Such a joke.
Yet again vp is injured and cesc has a breakdown once a month. The wenger line of too many games etc just doesn’t fucking wash. He makes 8 changes every game so no one should be tired. Also its a cup final so they should run their lungs off and leave nothing on the field