Thursday, June 28

By Nick Ames in Kiev

Former Arsenal captain Cesc Fabregas had done this before.

As he stepped up to take Spain’s fifth penalty last night, following a tense and goalless 120 minutes against Portugal, the similarity to Spain’s Euro 2008 quarter-final with Italy was inescapable. Then, after two scoreless hours, Cesc kept his cool to convert the winning spot-kick after Antonio Di Natale had missed for the Italians.

This time, the margin was slightly finer, his penalty cannoning in off the post following Bruno Alves’ miss to ensure that Spain will contest a second consecutive final here on Sunday.

Over in Warsaw, present-day Gunners Per Mertesacker and Lukas Podolski will have been watching with interest. Spain didn’t really start flexing their muscles until extra time and were probably just about worth their win, but the way in which the Portuguese knocked them out of their stride - while creating chances of their own - gives the impression that the Henri Delaunay Trophy remains very much up for grabs.

Lukas might land himself a recall to the German starting XI against Italy tonight, while another match on the sidelines looks likely for Per. It’s hard to envisage another goalless encounter tonight, and you’d expect Germany to nick it, but it would only take one moment of genius from Mario Balotelli to change the picture completely.

The opportunity to keep an eye on future Arsenal forwards has certainly been a feature of this tournament. Confirmation of Olivier Giroud’s long-mooted arrival on Tuesday has led to much discussion about his many attributes, and caused me to remember Sweden’s win over France nine days ago.

Then, I looked on with interest as Olivier was introduced late on as Laurent Blanc looked to invigorate a tepid French display. His first involvement was to thunder on to a corner and head inches wide, and if this serves as an example of his hunger inside the penalty area then the Gunners have a very good signing indeed.

With the final just three days away, Kiev is slowly beginning to get its glad rags on. The Olympic Stadium is undergoing a number of cosmetic changes, notably a banner reading ‘The Final’ being attached to its outside. After a very quiet couple of days here in the stadium’s Media Centre, a few more journalists are trickling in today, and we can expect an influx from Spain over the next day or two. Should the Germans prevail tonight, things will get very lively indeed - their media entourage has been the only one to seriously rival England’s for size.

I won’t be getting out and about too much today, there’s work to do ahead of the forthcoming Arsenal season, but am waiting on confirmation that I’ll be able to complete my Ukrainian Arsenal hat-trick with a visit to Bila Tserkva tomorrow.

Hopefully Lukas and Per will see to it that it’s not the final piece of Gunners-related activity that I’m able to report back on from Ukraine.

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Copyright 2013 The Arsenal Football Club plc. Permission to use quotations from this article is granted subject to appropriate credit being given to www.arsenal.com as the source 28 Jun 2012