No defence will Costa Gunners

CHELSEA could be looking at a big win in today’s FA Cup Final because I fear for Arsenal with so many defenders injured.

Even if some of them make it back in time to play, how fit will they be after missing training? It’s mission impossible.

Per Mertesacker hasn’t started a game all season. He can’t run. But Arsene Wenger won’t change his tactics. He won’t try to shut up shop.

He’ll leave his defenders exposed, open the game up and hope for the best. Eden Hazard and Diego Costa could tear them to shreds.

Hazard is the most likely matchwinner – but I would be doing everything I could to keep Costa if I was Antonio Conte.

Costa is like their unsung hero. He gives them that aggression, holds the ball up, makes the right runs, and scores goals.

This could be his last game before he goes to China and earns silly money. But Chelsea should offer him silly money to stay.

They should try and keep Costa instead of signing Romelu Lukaku.

He’s a better player, and if they both end up at Chelsea next season, then ®ÊINTERVIEW by PAUL BROWN Costa would play ahead of Lukaku. I don’t think we’ll see John Terry in the final, though. He didn’t play in the semifinal, even though Gary Cahill was out, and he won’t start this one.

If he gets on at the end, it’s only because they’re leading three or four nil.

Goodbye

People have criticised him for the guard-of-honour substitution against Sunderland, but I thought it was a brilliant touch.

Why not go out like that? He deserved it, and there was nothing riding on the game. But that was the game. That was his goodbye. It was like a testimonial.

Chelsea will have done phenomenally well if they win the Double in Conte’s first season. But they should remember it’s Arsenal they have to thank.

It was getting rinsed at the Emirates that convinced Conte to change his system – and they’ve been flying ever since. Even Arsenal are copying it now.

If they win it will be an amazing achievement.

But do they really compare to past Double winners?

How many of their players would you put in other teams that did the Double? Two or three maybe? Hazard and Kante? Probably. Victor Moses and Marcos Alonso? Probably not.

I think next season they will go hard for the Champions League. Some of those players have won the league in two of the last three years.

They will want to win in Europe now – and so will Conte because he’s never won it. You wouldn’t bet against them.

Whatever happens at Wembley, I won’t be there. I never go to this game. I’m a Chelsea fan but I’ve got too much respect for Arsenal fans.

But I’ll be watching on TV, and I can’t see anything but a Chelsea win. I just don’t know how Arsenal can stop them.