So many big hitters and we end up with a stumble in the jungle

Chief sports writer
gives his Final verdict

By Martin Samuel

THERE are only three things in life that can be guaranteed: Death, taxes, and a lousy Cup Final.

Watching this, eternity and 40p in the pound suddenly seemed a lot more fun.

What happened to Arsenal yesterday? What happened to the team whose swashbuckling style mesmerised a nation last season?

In Cardiff, they were insipid, unimaginative, conservative — words that have not been associated with a team coming out of Highbury since Arsene Wenger's French revolution began.

United can largely be absolved from blame for what was to most neutrals a crashing disappointment.

They had the best players on the field, in Wayne Rooney and Cristiano Ronaldo, created the lion's shares of chances and, had Arsenal been readier for the fight, could have made quite a game of it.

Instead, for more than two hours, they were left to punch themselves out. Arsenal's best — indeed, Arsenal's only — serious chance came from a set-piece. In open play it was only United who appeared intent to deliver on the pre-match hype that had touted this match as somewhere between the Rumble in the Jungle and the Return of the Sith.

Miracle

This has been the season of the cautious tacticians and if that is what Wenger was attempting by packing his midfield out and playing Dennis Bergkamp alone up front, then the game will be poorer for it.

Chelsea's title win is overdue and admirable but few would place its beauty alongside Manchester United's Treble winners or Arsenal's Invincibles in full flow.

Rafa Benitez has performed a minor miracle by leading Liverpool to Istanbul but few beyond Anfield would choose to watch their dogged resistance ahead of the true masters of the European game.

Arsenal and United have both, in their way, disappointed this season but the saving grace of both teams is that, at their best, they remain the epitome of the beautiful game.

Which made it all the stranger that these two should play out the first FA Cup Final to be settled on penalties, failing entirely in the principle art of the game — goalscoring.

How, after two hours, teams blessed with some of the finest technical forwards in Europe should stand goalless is a mystery. Even without Thierry Henry, Arsenal could call on the sublime skills of Dennis Bergkamp, Jose Reyes and Robert Pires.

The combination of Rooney and Ruud van Nistelrooy — not to mention last season's Man of the Match Ronaldo and the crafty Paul Scholes — should make Manchester United the most unstoppable force in the British game right now.

What this combined Hall of Fame produced was one gigantic zip.

Now for the ironic part: Having played out an afternoon that was at best frustrating and at worst borderline tedious, Manchester United and Arsenal then stuck away a collection of the most technically perfect penalties to complete the game. All bar one.

Scholes was the odd man out in 10. He scores goals, sing the fans, but not yesterday. He was thwarted by Arsenal goalkeeper Jens Lehmann and with Arsenal going five for five, it was game over.

Manchester United deserved more. They deserved the Cup, in fact.

Of course, there were exceptions amid the unfairness — men in Arsenal's ranks who will look at their winner's medal with warm memories of a job well done. Not least, Ashley Cole.

He has been under intense scrutiny this week, due to the imperfect timing of the Premier League inquiry into his misguided meeting with Chelsea. Wenger has wondered how his mind could be on the match, Arsenal supporters are unsure whether he will even be their player next season.

So when, with the shoot-out score tied at 3-3, he began the long march towards the Manchester United end to be Arsenal's fourth penalty taker, the tension in the stadium was ratcheted up a notch.

It was a key penalty. Score and Roy Keane would have to beat Lehmann to keep United in the game; miss and Scholes' earlier error would have been wiped clean.

Cole sized up Roy Carroll on United's goal-line and whipped his kick to the left, an impossible challenge for the Ulsterman. He wheeled away, not kissing the badge but beating his chest. Proud, with every right to be.

In many ways, it was an echo of the meeting of these teams in the 1979 FA Cup Final — a five-minute explosion of energy in search of a match to accompany it. The penalties were thrilling, a master-class of technique and composure. They seemed to belong to another day.

So what went wrong? Quite simply, Arsenal did not create, United could not convert. Sadly, it meant that what should have been the showpiece, the highlight, of the season, will be remembered only for injustice and its place in the record books as the first FA Cup Final to be decided by the lottery of a penalty shootout.

What an unsatisfactory end to the domestic campaign.

Only a fan could compare this game to the epic encounters that preceded it in the Premier League this season. Old Trafford saw the battle, brutal, gladiatorial, the game that ended Arsenal's tenure as the undefeated. Defeat was so hard to take, so bruising and demoralising that it altered the entire course of their season.

Highbury saw the high water mark of Manchester United's season. Sir Alex Ferguson's men have not performed at any time as they did there, superior to Arsenal in every way, tactically, technically, physically. It was a game that gave a glimpse of what United could still be and made us wonder why they were not.

Mistake

It was hoped this would combine the best of the two: The passion of Old Trafford, the sheer exhilaration of Highbury; instead, it did neither.

Arsenal, who barely turned up, left with the trophy but little credit beyond the red half of north London; the supporters of Manchester United, who face so much uncertainty off the field this summer, travelled north with the disquieting feeling that the world laughed behind their backs once more.

Maybe the mistake is billing it as the FA Cup Final in the first place.

Next time, invite the teams down, keep the whole thing a secret. "FA Cup Final, mate? Nah, no FA Cup Final round here. Never heard of it. This? Oh, this is just the match we play to end the season. No pressure. You just go out like it's a normal Saturday afternoon. FA Cup Final? You're having a laugh."

A typical Cup Final in so many ways. One day, the season will get the send-off it deserves — along with the secret of eternal life and a full rebate from the Chancellor, no doubt.