When the final kick was delivered, who would have wanted to be in the boots of Kepa Arrizabalaga? Raheem Sterling was setting off on his victory run, the trophy was back in Manchester City’s possession and Pep Guardiola had another piece of silverware for his collection. Yet that told only part of the story bearing in mind the incredible scenes involving Mauricio Sarri, his headstrong goalkeeper and the public show of disobedience that could conceivably accelerate the process of Chelsea looking for another manager.
It was a remarkable finale and an unorthodox one, too, bearing in mind Sarri’s failed attempts to substitute Arrizabalaga just before the game headed into the penalty shootout. Arrizabalaga had gone down twice with cramp in extra time and Sarri wanted to bring on Willy Caballero, a goalkeeper who had saved three penalties for City when they won this competition in 2016 with a shootout victory against Liverpool.
Arrizabalaga clearly had other ideas, signalling that he was fit, making it absolutely clear he had no intention of going off, then holding his ground and leaving Sarri close to the point of spontaneous combustion on the touchline. Caballero, the penalty specialist, was stripped from his tracksuit, ready to come on, but Arrizabalaga did not care. It was a staring contest – and Arrizabalaga’s refusal to blink meant he was always going to be the hero or villain in the shootout.
To his credit, the goalkeeper did manage to keep out Leroy Sané’s penalty. Not that it mattered, ultimately, when he also let one from Sergio Agüero go beneath his body, preceded by some failed Grobbelaar‑esque silliness to put off the scorer, and could not keep out the ones from Ilkay Gündogan and Bernardo Silva either.
Ederson, City’s goalkeeper, saved from Jorginho with the first kick of the shootout and, ultimately, David Luiz hitting the post with Chelsea’s fourth effort was the decisive miss. César Azpilicueta and Emerson had both beaten Emerson and Eden Hazard did so with the most outrageous chip. Yet the occasion will be remembered for the refusal of Chelsea’s goalkeeper to leave the pitch, the public show of rage from his manager and the unmistakable feeling that we were witnessing something unprecedented in a Wembley final.
Sarri was so incensed he stormed down the tunnel and, briefly, it was not entirely clear that he would even return. He thought better of that one – but it needed Antonio Rüdiger to hold him back from getting to the Spaniard before the game went to penalties.
To describe Sarri as livid would be an understatement. Justifiably, too, because it would be rare at any level to see a manager being disobeyed this way. For it to happen in a final, with his job potentially on line, was a calamity. The referee, Jon Moss, should have been firmer and told Arrizabalaga his number had flashed up on the electronic board and, frankly, that he needed to get off the pitch. Worse for Sarri, not enough Chelsea players backed up their manager. David Luiz tried to talk some sense into Arrizabalaga with no success. But where was Azpilicueta, the captain? Or the other senior players?
Not that City will care about those kind of details after winning this trophy for the fourth time in six seasons. It was their sixth victory overall and that means there is only Liverpool, with eight, who have been more successful in this competition. Pep Guardiola continues to insist a quadruple will be impossible, but it will not be for the lack of trying and, judging by the scenes at the end, they will have a lot of fun trying to find out.
For now, it should be enough that they have secured the season’s first silverware with a performance that was below their best – and certainly a long way short of the six-goal rampage in Manchester a fortnight ago when Guardiola’s men inflicted Chelsea’s heaviest defeat since 1991.
The last time they played one another, Chelsea were four goals down after 24 minutes. This time City managed only one shot on target throughout the first 90 minutes. There was even the strange phenomenon of Kevin De Bruyne misplacing several passes before being substituted. David Silva was also replaced. Hazard had looked the most threatening player on the pitch and Chelsea appeared to have learned from their Manchester ordeal. They were quick to the ball, they chased down their opponents and played with a collective understanding that, before anything else, they had to find a way to disrupt City’s rhythm.
Once they had managed that, Chelsea started to look increasingly dangerous in the second half, whereas their only threatening moment in the opening 45 minutes came when N’Golo Kanté set off after a long ball through the middle and looked as though he might get a clear run behind the City defence. As often happens with this referee, Moss was some way behind play when Oleksandr Zinchenko cut across Kanté and the Chelsea player went down. A free-kick in that position would have meant a red card and that was certainly what the end of the stadium wearing the darker shade of blue wanted. Instead, Moss waved on play and, more by luck than anything else, that was probably fair given that Kanté had actually controlled the ball on his hand as he ran between Aymeric Laporte and Zinchenko.
Laporte went off at half-time and when Fernandinho was injured later on that meant City, with all three substitutes used, had to wait until extra time before they could bring on a fourth, Danilo, in place of the Brazilian. Ultimately, though, the game will be remembered for the substitution that never was and, knowing what we do about Roman Abramovich, a farce that could have serious repercussions for the man who, for now, holds the title of Chelsea manager.
