This end of season dead-rubber was never likely to be the most intense of affairs but it was a good win and a nice way to close the book on a great season for the Gunners.
Wolves were about as far away from a cohesive team as I have seen this season and that lack of any sort of bond really told as Arsenal walked through them pretty much at will for 90 minutes, with the final scoreline a pretty accurate reflection of the match.
I know there wasn’t much to play for, and not much to be gained from going hell-for-leather for either side, but the way Wolves went about their business, in front of thousands of travelling fans, was lamentable, devoid of any real effort of will to win. If only West Ham, Southampton and Brighton had rolled over so meekly!
This isn’t a blog about Wolverhampton, though, so i’ll heap praise instead on what was a superbly effective display from Mikel Arteta’s men – the sort of confident, efficient, adventurous display that deserted us at precisely the wrong time in this campaign.
All across the pitch, the players were relaxed again, they were finding passes and creating chances in the way they did so regularly in the first half of the season and they were dominant in defence too. Even without William Saliba, Oleksandr Zinchenko and Gabriel Martinelli, the Gunners were a constant menace for the visitors, who found little joy in defence and got absolutely no change in attack.
Thought this wasn’t the end to the season that we wanted, it was an end that was at least worthy of the campaign itself. It was important that we went out on a high and we did just that.
Plaudits on the day have to go to the departing Granit Xhaka who may not have signed off with a Premier League title but most certainly signed off having transformed his trajectory and his relationship with the fans. He had a tremendous season in the heart of midfield and will be sorely missed. It was apt then that he should sign off with an excellent double (and he might even have had a hat-trick).
One of the biggest tasks Arteta and Edu face this summer is bringing in a midfielder to replace Xhaka and, thanks to his professionalism and perseverance, they will be big shoes to fill now. He is proof, should you need it, that you can never write a player off.
It was a good day for Bukayo Saka too. He has endured a bit of a quiet patch as the fortunes of the team wavered over the last month and his relief at getting back on the scoresheet yesterday was palpable. It may be the end of the season but that goal will still have done him good, if only to prove a little something to himself.
Saka has had a break-out season on the right wing and the challenge he will face now is to kick on and develop. Teams have started to double up on him with regularity and that was a problem for him in the final months of the campaign. He will need to work on that over the summer and find a way to adapt as the best players too because they are will come again for him in 2023/24 with the same energy and intensity.
For now, though, he can enjoy a well-earned break over the summer and look forward to some time away from the stresses and strains of football.
Jakub Kiwior getting himself on the scoresheet, from the unfamiliar surroundings at left back, was the icing on the cake for the Gunners and it was a delicious cake at that. The Pole picked up some minutes in the final month or so of the campaign and showed himself to be a capable operator. He will be needed next season from the outset so let’s hope he can use these last few weeks in particular as a jumping off point because the level will be raised again next season.
And that’s true for everyone in the squad. Manchester City are a relentless, cyborg-esque winning machine and if we are to compete with them seriously we will need to find ways to win in trying circumstances and we will need to find reserves deep within ourselves that ran dry in this campaign.
That’s a conversation- and a blog- for another day, though. For now, let’s enjoy what was an excellent win and the quite brilliant 10 months of football that preceded it.
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