PAIN IN PARIS

GLORIOUS FAILURE KIND OF EVENING

Champions League semi-finals don’t play by the same rules as normal games. Individual talent trumps everything. xG doesn’t really apply because the law of averages narrows. A 10% chance has 40% value when you have the best players in the world on the pitch. Shots creeping into the top corner that would hit the back of the net against any other team find themselves lightly fingered over the bar. Even dirty, deflected strikes from players who’ve never scored in the Champions League end up looking like outrageous worldies.

Arsenal lost to Paris as the better team over two legs. We lost with more xG. With better players. But we lost… and the lesson here is that football at this level is a roll of the dice — and really, exceptionalism decide the big games. Arsenal, sadly, lacked the individuals needed to make the graft pay. We were laying bricks for 20 euros an hour, Paris were flecking paint on a studio canvass, calling it art, and making million dollar pay days.

They had inspired moments in front of goal and didn’t have to work as hard for their goals as Arsenal. They had a keeper at his absolute peak dropping miracles. Arsenal just didn’t have those magic moments Arteta was talking about before the game.

We had the chances. Bukayo Saka skying over after clawing one back will be doing laps in his nightmares for months. Declan’s header that went just wide. Martinelli finding Donnarumma through a sea of legs. Martin Ødegaard’s perfect strike, saved. None of it matters. We didn’t have a player who could make the difference in the margins, who could make our dominance count, who could take us to the promised land.

But let’s frame this right… PSG spent €600 million on Mbappé’s salary alone. That’s nearly the total of Arsenal’s €783.8 million transfer spend over the past five years. PSG has had 13 attempts at the competition and only made the semi-finals three times up until yesterday. This is only their second final. It took them seven seasons to get past the quarter-finals. It took Man City 10 attempts to get to a final.

Arsenal making the semi-finals at the second attempt — and getting there with no striker, a fifth-choice centre-back, and a 60% fit Bukayo Saka — is a fucking good job. We played PSG without five key players and recorded the highest number of shots they’ve faced all season. We are coached magnificently and our time will come.

I’m writing this late at night. I don’t have the energy right now to get too into the weeds, but overall, my takeaway is we learned a lot about this Arsenal side. We have an incredible system that can go up against anyone, even when depleted. The culture at the club is top-tier. Those boys played gassed and still took it to PSG. The squad is better than Arteta gave it credit for at the start of the season. He learned so much about players like Kiwior, Merino, and even MLS — who had a torrid game but showed incredible character to power through.

If you don’t think Arsenal were brilliant over the two legs and all you’ve got is NOT GOOD ENOUGH, I feel for you. You’re not watching the game right. 3.16 xG, away, against a team people were calling the best in Europe on Tuesday. You’re lost if you can’t see the good in that. You can’t feel where we are as a team or understand the context of how we got to a semi-final. There are plenty of you out there, and no doubt there will be a load in the comments section. But who cares — I feel proud of what Arsenal have done in the Champions League, and I’m more certain than ever that we’re very, very close to winning it all.

I also don’t want to hear from the Ollie Watkins fans. I’m struggling to understand why people think a player with fewer Premier League goals than Merino was the solve for our troubles. If Unai Emery thought it was best to drop him in the quarter-finals against PSG, across two legs, why does anyone think he was the missing link for Arsenal? Is Unai sabotaging his own objectives? Or has he seen something that made him want to sell to a club he knew was desperate?

If you put a young powerhouse forward in our side, with an explosive winger, and a No. 6 like Zubimendi… then Arsenal can finally be the team. We’re so close to perfection.

If the manager can be convinced that his load management caused the crush of injuries that derailed the season, then we’ll have solved his biggest weakness by far — and maybe he’ll get out of his own way, and we can match Liverpool’s approach and keep our best players out on the pitch for longer.

This summer, in my eyes, is the last chance Arteta gets at doing it with this crop of players. We have a whole group of insanely talented players entering their mid-twenties contract window. If we don’t deliver something major next year, those players will be off — and that would be their right after seven years.

But I have a strong feeling this summer is going to be a monster one. The ownership group will know they played their role in a botched, lacklustre summer last year, and it will be rectified with an early run at deals.

Remember, we’ll tie down all our best names. The players we’re chasing have no obstacles in front of them because they’re at clubs that need money so they can reinvest… and then we have an outrageously clear preseason. No international comps. We’re not in any crazy club tours. It’s just a straight shot of pure preseason.

So in short, this Champions League run — and terrible season — has given us more than you think. We’ve blooded £120m worth of teenagers. Seen what Merino and Calafiori can do. We’ve learned that Timber is one of the best full-backs on the planet. We’ve learned that even 5th-choice centre-backs can play a role. And most importantly, on our day, we can best Real Madrid.

No trophies again hurts. Watching Inter vs PSG in the final is going to sting. Seeing Liverpool lift a title the way they did is like a double ACL blowout.

But our time is here. I’ve seen enough. We’re winning a major trophy next season for sure.

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