Well, that was disappointing yesterday, wasn’t it?

Another League Cup Final, another defeat in it, and at this point, it feels like that competition is as cursed for us as the European ones are.

Simply put, Arsenal only showed up for one half, on a day in which there were hopes that we could get a trophy monkey off our back.

I have lots of emotions going on right now; lots of thoughts that might be worth picking up, given that we now go into an interlull, but for today, let’s just pick on one or two of the key talking points from yesterday.

Firstly, I don’t think any is getting away from the fact that the goalkeeper question was a primary reason why we lost yesterday. Kepa is a fine backup. We discussed it in the pub before the game, and I said I was ok with him starting, but hindsight is a wonderful thing, and clearly it wasn’t the right move. The delta between Kepa and Raya is quite large, it seems, and I’m not only talking about the rick that our keeper made in the game to give City the lead. His passing range is not as wide as Raya’s, and his box presence isn’t the same, which I think also leads to a little bit less confidence in the back line. The first goal we conceded yesterday will be one that will give him nightmares. It was proper chocolate wrists stuff, and whereas at the other end, Trafford gave a decent account of himself in the first half with a couple of saves, when the pressure was on us in the second, our goalkeeper folded in that key moment. And that’s what we don’t get with Raya. Sure, he’s had his dodgy moments like the end of the Wolves away game, but in the main, he is solid, and even with little to do, he still has the concentration in key moments that Kepa just doesn’t have (think that great save against Leverkusen at the end of the game last week).

I don’t blame Arteta for starting Kepa, because as I said, I think this was one that he felt he could do. But I don’t think we’ll see the Spaniard in between the sticks if we get to the FA Cup final. And his error yesterday kind of gives Arteta the licence to sit him down if that happens and say “sorry mate, not after what happened last time.

This was one of those cliched ‘game of two halves’ kind of matches. I thought we bested Man City in the first; we limited their chance creation, whilst we got in behind at least once, and Kai probably should have scored. That’s what you occasionally get with Kai, though; he isn’t always the most clinical. Ironically, if Gyokeres had been in that position, it might have been different, but he was somewhere else on the pitch, not getting those chances. But it fell to Kai; Trafford did his job, which we didn’t see from Kepa in the second half, which was also the half in which we failed to respond to City’s approach. They pressed in the right spaces, they were able to control more of the ball, and whilst they hardly troubled Kepa until his mistake, they were definitely edging it. And I think Arteta will do a re-watch of this game and realise that he probably should have made the changes a little earlier than he did. Kai didn’t have a great game, Gyokeres was pretty anonymous, Saka’s poor form continues, and Trossard was left pretty much neutralised and quiet. In that second half in particular, the attack didn’t click, and we simply could not string together enough passes or get enough of a rhythm to cause City any problems.

That second half was woefully short of the ‘standards’ that Arteta and the team set, and unfortunately, in 2026, it’s not an isolated incident. There’s plenty made about the fact that not pressing Arsenal’s defenders is a good way of neutralising them. I think that’s only part of the story. History is always written by the victors, and City fans and the stats people have already been clipping up short videos of City sitting back whilst 1-0 up and us playing the ball across our back four. But game state is everything. I said yesterday morning that the first goal would be pivotal, and I think that’s exactly why yesterday felt so flat in the end, but that’s how it turned out to be. And I don’t want to make this all about Kepa, because so many other players didn’t play remotely to their potential, but in these tight games, there’s nothing more frustrating than a mistake leading to a goal. If a player puts the ball in the top bins from 30 yards, you just hold your hands up, but when the important goal you concede is entirely avoidable, it is doubly hard to take.

I do think the absence of Eze and Odegaard had somewhat of an impact, though. Eze has just found some form, and now he’s injured, which is really frustrating. Arteta said that we have to leave it seven days for a scan, but we have to pray that it is just a short-term thing, because whilst he can rest up for a week because of these internationals, ideally we want to see him on the road to recovery for Southampton in two weeks. In his place Havertz looked at first like he might link up well with Big Vik, and there were a couple of moments where, from my vantage point, I could see us almost playing with two up top, but he faded quickly after a good opening half an hour and the lack of that creative 8/10 hybrid felt like it began to take its toll.

So City draws first blood. Seeing the dejected Arsenal players wasn’t a fun sight afterwards, but the hope has to be that they use this as fuel, because after this international break, there is a great opportunity to get back on the wagon and on to winning ways with an away game against Southampton.

This was the least of our priorities, but that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t sting, for which I thought Declan Rice summed it up well when describing the mood after this match. Now there is an opportunity to just take a beat, for the players to go away with their respective international teams, which hopefully will provide enough of a reset, before we get back to the proper football over the Easter weekend.

As I said above, I might do a bit of a deeper dive into some of the problems we’ve had in attack over the coming days, given that I have no interest whatsoever in the international nonsense going on from now until the end of next week.

So I’ll catch up with you back on here tomorrow. Up the Arsenal.