Arsene Wenger says he’s looking forward to his latest chance to break his League Cup duck having never won the tournament in his time at Arsenal.
The boss has twice led his side to the final, in 2007 and 2011, only to be defeated by Chelsea and Birmingham City respectively.
He’ll have a third opportunity to complete a domestic hat-trick on 25 February after the Gunners set up a final with Manchester City after overcoming Chelsea 2-1 on aggregate in the semis.
“Yes, I want to win it and we are out of the FA Cup where we were always focused on, so we want to focus on this trophy now,” Wenger told Arsenal.com.
“Everybody always wants to win trophies and in England, many teams can win, so it’s important that when you have an opportunity you can do it.
“It will be a difficult game certainly, but let’s prepare well for our next Premier League game, we want to get back in the top four and need to be consistent now.”
Up until last weekend, Arsenal had endured a stuttering start to 2018. The boss now believes the prospect of a Wembley final will prove to be a fillip in the weeks to come.
“It is a big lift, it is always a special day that you never forget. I believe that’s important and I’m convinced that our fans will be happy to go there and they have been there a few times. It is a good habit.”
Arsenal have won nine of their last ten visits to Wembley and will be hoping to secure a fourth trophy in five years. Obviously, Pep Guardiola’s runaway Premier League leaders represent intimidating opponents but as we proved in last year’s FA Cup semi-final, anything can happen on the day.
Tough match but let’s hope we do it, third time lucky for Arsene.
Incredible that he has made more Wembley appearances than Sp*rs ever have even including their 19 at home at Wembley this season.
If that’s true, it’s the best fact ever…
Can someone verify. I thought surely not but. Fa cups (albeit some in cardiff), semi’s, Our CL ties in the naughties. 2 League cups, community shields? Must be close.
Even though it is a minor domestic trophy, its still a trophy and we did well to see off chelsea.
Hopefully shitty will have a slight off day.
Personally I swap cup finals for a team that is challenging until the last minute for the league title and a proper go at the champs league.
You know, in other countries the “supercup”–the Community Shield, in other words–is counted as a trophy.
It’s going to come down to taking chances. We all know Pep’s teams have the ability to be porous at times and will allow space and time in the final third occasionally. We’ve just got to capitalise on those 3 v 3’s or 2 v 2’s Citeh do sometimes give. There’s no way we are keeping a clean sheet so it’s going to be all about who scores more. COYG!
IF we do sign Auba, he can play in the final right?
Yep, mkhitaryan played for utd in it already afaik
I’ve given Arsene a lot of stick over the last five or so years, I still don’t think we are as good as we could be but you have to give him credit, he may have made us a cup team but he’s made us a very good cup team. Quite how we can lose to Bournemouth and continue to have the upper hand over Chelsea I’ll never know (that’s Arsene) but if Redknapp or Pochettino had won three FA Cups & got to another final the journo’s would be falling over themselves with praise even more than what they… Read more »
That’s the spirit!
Wenger is a victim of his success, that’s why.
Yes ! What’s wrong with winning cups !
11th English cup final appearance, anyone know how this stacks up against other managers?
Birmingham City….I somehow had purged that match from my memory, until reading this story.
If Wenger decides to leave at the end of this year…and Zidane is available. Do anyone here think he could be a good appointment for Arsenal?
Diego Simeone seems like the the best option for me – he’s struggling at Athletico, it would be amazing to have him take over.
Why would he come? No England connection (or English, I don’t think), seems to like Spain, nothing whatsoever to prove.
Ah, Birmingham City. You wonder whether the later Wenger era might have been different if the game hadn’t ended the way it did.
Great result yesterday. I would love for us to win the trophy and give Wenger the domestic treble! Whether he stays or goes, he deserves that one.
On a separate note, and apologies for raising a a topic out of context, but I so hope we can do an Özil-LANS!!! On form, our guy is untouchable!
Adding Europa would be awesome too, imagine we did both…
Looking at Hazard the other day its a miracle the Chavs don’t get more grief. They are a one man team, so are Spurs and maybe Liverpool but they at least have a plan. How fun would it be to put an offer in for Eden, he’d have a ball playing wide of Ozil with Mkhi on the other side… – he wouldn’t come (I mean if Coutinho is 150m…) but a fella can dream!
We can beat the petrol boys in the final. We are the Red Army and we are a lean mean machine. COYG.
Hey, question – if we finish 6th and fail to win Europa League, we will not have qualified to Europe via PL next year, correct?
Now, since ManCity will be in the Champions League next season, does this mean we have a guaranteed Europa League place next season, regardless of the cup final outcome?
Think if City win final then that Europa spot will go to 6th place team don’t think runners up get it. Southampton were losing finalists last season and didn’t get in Europa even though Man U beat them and got in Champions League.
From what I can figure out–yes if we finish sixth, not certain if we are lower. If Man City win the League Cup and also qualify for the Champions League through their Premier League place (as they are sure to), then Man City’s place in the Europa League goes to the next spot down in the Premier League standings, not to the League Cup finalist.
I thought the FA cup was the only cup that mattered for a spot in Europa league?
What did people think off the offside decisions against us last night?
I thought they were fucking awful.
There were at least two offsides called against us, maybe three, where our man wasn’t even close to being offside. Both assistants had shockers.
If I was Arsene’s duck I would be very afraid.