After his team failed to make the statement required, Mikel Arteta had evidently been considering a few different messages. He first had to find the right words for his players.
By the time the Arsenal squad got back to their families in Budapest, there were a lot of tears. It turns out this fixture could never be a “free hit”, even if you have just won a title. It’s far too big, with too much meaning. Arsenal came far too close to a feat that all of these players have dreamed about; to be European champions.
But not quite close enough.
There was pride but also real “pain”, as Arteta put it. He naturally talked about using it as “fuel”, as Arsenal have repeatedly done with disappointment during his time at the club. They responded to a tough fifth-place after a thrashing by Tottenham Hotspur in 2021-22 by challenging for the title. They responded to three second-place finishes by finally winning that title.
And, in the Champions League, they have progressively got better every year: quarter-final, semi-final, final… and next?
To go that final step and actually become European champions for the first time in the club’s history, Arteta knows Arsenal need to do more, especially in attack.
His post-match press conference wasn’t just this emotional appeal about learning from defeat. It was also a message, not least to the ownership.
The extent of the praise for Paris Saint-Germain was conspicuous. “They are, in my opinion, the best team in the world,” Arteta said. “What they are able to do with the ball, with individual actions, I haven’t seen it, and it’s not the plan to play in certain areas when you don’t have the ball, but they force you to do that.”
More tellingly, there was a lot of talk about Arsenal needing “to improve and to reach a different level”, and “to find different margins to get the outcome that we want”.
In other words, that they are too constrained, that the margins they play in are too thin; that they need better attackers. Arteta will surely know that this same PSG have already gone in with a very strong offer for Arsenal target Julian Alvarez. Within Arsenal, there’s very much a sense of Arteta wishing he could do what PSG do. They are a state sportswashing project, mind.
It’s at that point where a few different arguments are possible, and multiple things can be true at the same time.
A lot of that approach is on Arteta himself, where all of the angst about finally winning the title saw him get more and more controlling – not always to the team’s benefit. They are a very different team than they were in 2022-23.
For all the criticism of the defensive approach in this final, though, the reality is that it is not a normal game.
Nobody else has come so close to stopping this PSG in big Champions League games. They’ve eventually scorched through everyone else in open play. They put eight past Chelsea, six past Bayern Munich and four past Liverpool.
Here, Luis Enrique’s team didn’t know what to do and didn’t look like doing much at all from open play. They needed a rash foul from Cristhian Mosquera, who had previously been brilliant. Arsenal’s plan worked fine, that penalty aside. Even there, it shows the ever-present danger of PSG’s attack, and how a player like Kvicha Kvaratshkelia only needs a millisecond. Arsenal have no attacker close to that quality.
Their gameplan was still close to perfect, and it was the rational choice. Sir Alex Ferguson ultimately lost two Champions League finals because he allowed the romance and memories of 1960, watching Real Madrid’s 7-3 demolition of Eintracht Frankfurt at Hampden Park, to take over when taking on a side of comparable quality in Barcelona 2009 and 2011. He went front foot, despite the reservations of many of his players, and lost badly.
And this is the level we’re talking about with this PSG.
Nevertheless, there will be a lingering regret over whether Arsenal themselves could have gone up a level, introduced a touch more nuance.
They had the lead. PSG were panicking. When Kvaratshkelia and Ousmane Dembele went off, they were nowhere near as intimidating. They could have built through the phases more, while still retaining structure. This is absolutely linked to a medium-term mindset.
It admittedly didn’t help that the game became so ragged with all of those subs, but the technical execution outside Kai Havertz’s finish was not of that level. Bukayo Saka had some bad touches around the PSG box, while all of Gabriel Martinelli, Eberechi Eze and Noni Madueke overhit simple passes when a chance was on.
They lacked that killer edge, something that only becomes more acute in a fixture where the margins become so tight.
It is probable that some of this is conditioned by mindset. When you are so immersed in such a constrained approach, it can be very difficult to come out of it. That applies to the intensity of this occasion, but also the last two seasons.
There are many caveats, but it’s how Arsenal have been geared. Arteta now needs to change the gears, especially having won the title.
They can’t go another season like that.
But then you probably can’t win a Champions League final against a team like PSG with Madueke, Martinelli and Viktor Gyokeres as your finishing attacking trio. That isn’t really the level required.
And while this will be no consolation to an Arsenal team that came within a few kicks of being European champions, there is arguably something fitting about not quite doing so yet – setting aside reservations about Qatari ownership.
Arsenal are a very strong team, and deserving domestic champions, but that has also come from calculatedly maximising every one of those strengths.
If you are given to romance and the mythos of this competition, you want the European champions to be that bit more complete.
And that’s where Arteta wants to go next. He wants a higher-level attack, and there is still the possibility of bringing in two players. The wonder now is whether this moment leads to a push for higher quality, for the attackers who can properly elevate the team. Kvaratshkelia is unique, but you can get someone closer to him.
Arteta has probably neglected that end of the team too much, with the emphasis of his spending – depth and defence – reflecting the emphasis of his play.
He himself could also do with adding more sophistication to his attacking, and moving the team up. The quest for the title has locked him into a certain mode of thinking as much as the team.
The talk within the club this season has duly been of how victory could “unlock” something in the team.
They need that to be true to go that final step.
