We are well on track to achieve our much coveted first trophy after five long and barren years. Yesterday’s 2-0 home win over Wigan (watch the goals here) puts us into a record 14th semi-final appearance in the League Cup. Furthermore, with Manchester United losing to West Ham, we are undoubtedly the favourites to lift the trophy this year.
What’s more heartening to see was despite making 9 changes to the team that perform so well against Aston Villa at the weekend, our team still had enough quality to steamrolled past a resilient Wigan. There was no doubt that the Latics were going all out to win the match as well but there was just too much quality flowing through the team. If our forwards hadn’t been so wasteful in front of goal, the winning margin would have been much more.
Our finishing this year has been poor and it showed again in this match. I have always said that we need to improve on killing of the opponent. Vela’s miss when clean through on goal is almost unforgivable. If you look at his body language when striking the ball, it was as if he was over-confident in putting the ball into the net.
Well that is what we need to guard against: complacency. Arsene has come out to acknowledge our status as favourites in this competition but he warned that favourites don’t mean anything until you win the trophy.
Although none of the team still in the competition poses a challenge to the Gunners on paper, we have to work just as hard because all the other teams will be gunning to bring us down.
That is for January when the semi-finals roll along. As for now, we just savour the victory and move on to concentrate on the task at hand in the title race and Champions League.
