Arsenal's wait for European football's grandest prize continues after a cruel penalty shootout defeat to Paris Saint Germain in tonight's Champions Le...
Arsenal's wait for European football's grandest prize continues after a cruel penalty shootout defeat to Paris Saint Germain in tonight's Champions League final. The match itself was a tense, tactical stalemate. Both sides cancelled each other out in a war of attrition that stretched deep into extra time. There was little to separate Mikel Arteta's meticulous structure and Luis Enrique's transitional threat. The game, as so often happens in these high stakes deciders, came down to nerve from twelve yards.And that is where the real controversy lies. Eberechi Eze stepped up to take Arsenal's second penalty of the shootout. He opted for the stuttering, stop start run up that has become fashionable but increasingly riGoalZaza in modern football. It backfired horribly. The delay allowed Gianluigi Donnarumma to read his intentions and make a relatively comfortable save. Watching from the studio, Steven Gerrard did not hold back. He called it nonsense. He called it a mistake. He was right.Let's be brutally honest here. In a Champions League final, you do not try to be clever. You pick your spot, you trust your technique, and you strike the ball with authority. That stuttering run up is a gamble. It might work against a keeper who dives early, but against a world class shot stopper like Donnarumma, it is an invitation to be read. Eze lost his nerve. He bottled the moment. His hesitation gave the goalkeeper a split second advantage, and that was all it took to swing the shootout in PSG's favour.Gabriel Magalhaes also missed from the spot, but his was a poor penalty struck without conviction. Together, those two failures handed the trophy to the Parisians. Arsenal's players will feel sick. Their fans will feel a hollow sense of deja vu. This was a final that was there for the taking. Both sides were exhausted. The game was crying out for a hero. Instead, it got a piece of tactical nonsense that will haunt Eze for the rest of his career.What makes this even more frustrating is that Arsenal had the tools to win. Their low block had frustrated PSG all night. Their transitional moments were sharp. But football, at its highest level, punishes the weak minded. Eze's penalty was not unlucky. It was a technical and psychological failure born of a fad that has no place in a shootout of this magnitude. Gerrard, a man who knows a thing or two about Champions League drama, called it exactly as it was. And he was right.
