Heartache...and Redemption!

Wow, what an incredible Champions League Final. Incredible play by Arsenal, questionable and just plain criminally bad refereeing, and a bitter loss for the Gunners.

For the first 17 minutes, Arsenal outplayed in commanding fashion, the Catalan Kids. Henry had 2 very close to goal shots in the first 3 minutes. And then, a huge defensive blunder and Eto'o was through  1 V. 1 with Jens Lehman. The German missed the ball and did the only thing left to him, pull down Eto'o. Out comes the red card, off goes Lehman. Arsenal down to 10 men. But then Barcelona flubbed the free kick (the first of many disappointing plays by Ronaldinho, who had an off night). In the 37th minute, a sure-to-be Oscar-nominated flop by Emanuel Eboue earned a free kick, which Sol Campbell drove into the goal with a soaring header. Elation! We were down a man, but up a goal. The game was in hand, it was ours to lose.

The Gunners played a heroic game. The defense turned back attack after attack. Emergency GK Almunia made some great saves, including a fingertip deflection near the end of the first half. Arsenal mounted several lightning quick attacks that nearly paid off. Henry and Llungberg played as if their lives depended on the outcome.

And then disaster. Larsson played a ball off to Eto'o who drove it past Almunia into the back of the net. A few minutes later Larsson set up Belletti for the game winner and Arsenal's dream of European glory came crashing down.

Much has been written on this game and you can read here and here and here and here. I'm going to focus on two aspects of the game that were critical. First, the refereeing. Not all bad, but the bad was disastrous and only flowed one way, against the boys from North London. Replays showed that Eto'o's goal should've been disallowed for offsides. But the linesman did not raise his flag, and the referee didn't bother to check with him anyways. To miss an offsides call that raised the equalizer is a game deciding error. If the correct call had been applied, the cup would've come home to London.

The card on Lehman was the correct call, though the referee could've played the advantage and allowed the goal and lehman to stay on (though if he had done so, I'm certain Arsenal would've won, given the dominance they were showing in this game).

And, finally, coaching. Arsenal outplayed Barcelona, but Frank Rikjaard outcoached Arsene Wenger. In the second half, Barcelona desperately needed more attacking power. Rikjaard astutely called for Larsson, who it turned out was the difference (and should've been man of the match), and Belletti, who scored the winner.

At the same time, Arsenal was getting tired playing down a man and their defense was sitting deeper and deeper, giving Barcelona dangerous room to build on. Wenger resisted making a substitution until it was too late in the game to have much effect. Throw out the refereeing mistakes and that was the difference.

The defeat was tough to swallow, particularly when the team's performance suggested they were the true champions. But the loss was washed away the day after when Thierry Henry announced that he would indeed be signing a new contract with the Gunners and wanted to stay with the team for the rest of his career. With Henry at the top of his game and staying with the club, the future is incandescent for Arsenal. By the way, for my money, Thierry Henry is one of the classiest soccer players currently playing professional football. (Forget the whining at the end of the Final). Arsenal will win the Champions League final with him as their captain.