WHAT HAPPENED
A ruthless display from Manchester City ended our hopes of lifting the first League Cup of Arsene Wenger’s reign on Sunday.
We came into the game as underdogs, and were right up against it when Sergio Aguero opened the scoring for Pep Guardiola’s side midway through the first half.
Goals from Vincent Kompany and David Silva did the damage after the restart as we slipped to a disappointing defeat at Wembley.
The first chance of the game arrived in the eighth minute as Wilshere, Ramsey and Ozil combined to create a chance for Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, but the Gabon forward was denied by some last-ditch defending from Kyle Walker and Claudio Bravo.
It was an encouraging sign, but the threat posed by City was demonstrated within 60 seconds as they raced down the other end, with Aguero firing into the sidenetting.
The Argentinean striker didn’t need asking twice when a second opportunity came his way not long afterwards though, brushing off the challenge of Shkodran Mustafi before lobbing David Ospina to give Pep Guardiola’s side the lead.
The departure of Nacho Monreal with a knock soon afterwards further disrupted our plans, but we still had history on our side: for not only had we come back from a goal down to beat City at Wembley last season, but we had done the same on the two previous occasions we lifted the League Cup.
Kevin De Bruyne hit the sidenetting before the interval as City continued to threaten, but we struggled to fashion an opening of note against the Premier League’s meanest defence.
Guardiola’s side started the second period the brighter of the two teams, with Laurent Koscielny called upon to make a fine block to force Kompany’s half-volley wide.
But the City captain did not have long to wait to find the scoresheet, diverting the ball beyond Ospina from Ilkay Gundogan’s shot just before the hour mark.
Things went from bad to worse minutes later as David Silva found some space in the area and blasted the ball low into the far corner to compound our misery.
Try as we might, there was no way back as City went on to claim the cup.
HOW IT HAPPENED
See how the match unfolded with our play-by-play commentary.
WHAT’S NEXT
Having just faced Manchester City, we’ll play them all over again on Thursday as the champions-elect visit Emirates Stadium in the Premier League.
We drew 2-2 in the corresponding fixture last season, with goals from Theo Walcott and Shkodran Mustafi cancelled out by Leroy Sane and Aguero.
Copyright 2024 The Arsenal Football Club Limited. Permission to use quotations from this article is granted subject to appropriate credit being given to www.arsenal.com as the source.