BAKU OR BUST
Arsenal need return to the big time and Sarri fate in balance
Unai Emery was his usual diplomatic self but, in a rather appropriate reflection of his first season at arsenal, one of his defenders appeared to have missed the memo. His manager having gently played down the greater importance of a Europa League final win for a team as yet outside the Champions League, Sokratis ploughed straight in. ‘We know that if we’re to be in the Champions League next year, we have to win,’ he said. ‘So, for us, it’s more motivation.’ no, no, no — that’s not the party line. Emery had earlier spoken of the trophy as its own reward, dismissing the idea that Chelsea’s third place and guaranteed spot in Europe’s biggest competition next season has relieved some of the pressure on maurizio Sarri and his players.
and, of course, no player lamely surrenders a final, and certainly no manager of Sarri’s status — still without a major title as a coach.
yet if arsenal do win the first all-London European final tonight, it will be the fourth time in the five years since the Europa League carried a Champions League
promotion, that the prize has gone to a team seeking it. Only Atletico Madrid, last year’s winners, played for glory alone.
Sevilla, in 2015 and 2016, and Manchester United in 2017, were all outside Champions League qualification when they won. With another elite shakedown coming, it is more vital than ever for a club not to be on the wrong side of that drawbridge when it raises. Baku or bust for Arsenal? It is beginning to edge that way.
Arsenal, for all their fame at home, and fortune in the global market, are vulnerable. They are not European royalty in terms of success, boasting a single European trophy in 48 years, and that a quarter of a century ago.
Arsenal have not won a European final that actually exists these days. The Inter-Cities Fairs Cup died in 1971, a year after Arsenal’s win over Anderlecht, and the European Cup-Winners’ Cup limped through five more years following Arsenal’s victory against Parma in 1994.
If there is another coup planned, why would Arsenal be among the chosen? They cannot afford a third season outside the Champions League. If there is any skulduggery going on — and the latest proposal awards a guaranteed longer-term place to any team reaching the Champions League final 16 — Arsenal have to be in on it.
So, hell yes, this is bigger for them than Chelsea. Nothing can be taken for granted with the Premier League the most competitive in Europe. And while Arsenal may be among the giants in terms of revenue, the idea they will be made a special case cannot be presumed. They are not Manchester United. This may explain why, at a recent football business summit, Arsenal chief executive Vinai Venkatesham appeared the least enthused about a breakaway European super league. ‘Anything bad for the Premier League is bad for us,’ he said. Indeed: particularly if you’re not invited.
So there is an absolute need for Arsenal to be strong in Europe again.
Their standing has slipped too far of late. When Arsenal were last a Champions League club, they were also the butt of jokes on Bayern Munich’s social media feed. ‘Can we play you every week?’ it was asked, after another 5- 1 drubbing. They were a punchline, not a threat.
So Arsenal need to lay down a marker. Chelsea were European champions in 2012, Europa League winners a year later. Including the UEFA Super Cup they have won four European trophies since Arsenal collected their last. Sarri may have much to prove — and do not underestimate Eden Hazard’s desire to bow out a winner in what is almost certain to be his last game in blue — but Chelsea’s need is not Arsenal’s.
There was certainly an air of mission accomplished about them yesterday, despite pre- match spats and increasing doubts over the readiness of N’Golo Kante, which Sarri put at 50-50, but is believed to be more heavily stacked against. Sarri said he had three fit midfielders for three midfield roles, but that was the only flicker of negativity.
He spent a lot of time smiling, waving at friendly faces in his press conference audience, and speaking of the love he feels for his players. He talked as if this group, and his growing affection for English football, may be a factor in any decision he has to make regarding his future this summer; although history suggests it is rarely the Chelsea manager that gets to make that call.
Perhaps Sarri can relax now knowing he has options — and Juventus is rather a good one — and that by getting Chelsea into the Champions League via domestic position he has delivered on Roman Abramovich’s primary demand.
This trophy, then, becomes the quite delicious dairy on top. A trophy, and a prestigious one at that, but without the financial precipice at which Arsenal stare. As a steady dribble of fans arrived in Baku late yesterday it was clear the consequences of failure for the two clubs were markedly different, even if the trek across Europe afforded affinity.
Whatever happens tonight — and in the wee, small hours of Thursday local time, given the 11pm kick- off — it is plain this fixture will be remembered as much for its politics. ‘Together in Baku’ reads the official UEFA branding, but that’s a laugh, although not for the exiled Henrikh Mkhitaryan. Together in the pub, maybe. Together on the sofa for most. It is hard to imagine a European final that has taken place with less evidence of travelling support.
Having arrived here Monday evening, and reaching the stadium yesterday afternoon, the shirt count to that point read: Arsenal 1, Chelsea 1, Liverpool 1, Real Madrid 1, Manchester United (shorts, not shirt, in fairness) 1.
Anyway, the concept of togetherness, as patented by UEFA, is illusionary. There were numerous high-ranking UEFA dignitaries on a connecting plane from Frankfurt to Baku on Monday. Arriving in Azerbaijan they were met at the bottom of the gangway by a young woman with names on a placard, and whisked off never to be seen again. Not in passport control, not in baggage claim. Working for UEFA is like being Keyser Soze. And like that — puff — they’re gone.
This is why the governing body locates finals and tournaments in places like Baku — because, apart from some dead time in the air studying the latest plans to carve up the Champions League for the benefit of an elitist, protectionist, club cabal, it doesn’t matter to them where the match is. They swish from the airport, to the
five- star hotel, to the venue. It could be Rotterdam, or anywhere, as the song goes, Liverpool or Rome. This year, it’s Baku.
And if you can get there, once you’re here, it’s fine because Baku is full of people — and butterflies at this time of year, delightfully — and people are basically nice. So if you’re lost, they try to help. If you’re struggling to work out how to obtain a Bak-card to ride the metro, a nice stranger might come up and pay for you on his.
And they don’t see many foreigners and are very proud of their modern republic. So if you look like a visitor, three policemen might come over and give you a brief history lesson on Nizami metro station platform. So now you know it is named after Nizami Ganjavi, the greatest romantic poet in Persian literature, born in the 12th century in Ganja, in what is now Azerbaijan.
So in that respect it is lovely visiting Baku, because of the people and the newness. Yet the media are privileged travellers, too. Just not as privileged as UEFA.
For the supporters, it’s still remote and arduous. It remains a scandal that so few were able to get to such a historic match for English football.
The organisers should walk in ordinary shoes once in a while, and then we’ll see where finals get played.