Soccer can be cruel. Just as Eberechi Eze hit top form in what had largely been an underwhelming debut season for Arsenal, he was robbed of an appearance in Sunday’s Carabao Cup final against Manchester City due to an innocuous knock.
Eze set the ball rolling in a comfortable 2–0 victory for the Gunners against Bayer Leverkusen with a blistering thump from the edge of the box. While the emphatic nature of that finish stole the focus, that the summer recruit was even starting could be viewed as an individual triumph.
As recently as the Carabao Cup semifinal first leg against Chelsea, Eze was not in Arteta’s first-choice XI. The 27-year-old started just one of Arsenal’s seven games after Christmas and was an unused substituted in more than half of those. However, since bagging a brace against Tottenham Hotspur in N17, Eze enjoyed a run of seven starts in eight, the only blemish on that record an FA Cup tie against Mansfield Town which saw him come off the bench to score anyway.
With Martin Ødegaard still sidelined through injury, Eze was nailed on to line up at Wembley against City until misfortune intervened.
It got lost in the fog of his heroics but Eze came off against Leverkusen after sustaining a knock. The match-winner assured TNT Sports in a postmatch interview: “I’m alright, I’ll be O.K.” But that proved to be too optimistic.
Arsenal’s Confirmed XI vs. Man City
Starting XI: Kepa Arrizabalaga; Ben White, William Saliba, Gabriel, Piero Hincapié; Declan Rice, Martín Zubimendi; Bukayo Saka, Kai Havertz, Leandro Trossard; Viktor Gyökeres.
Substitutes: David Raya, Cristhian Mosquera, Gabriel Jesus, Gabriel Martinelli, Christian Nørgaard, Noni Madueke, Myles Lewis-Skelly, Max Dowman.
Arteta Replaced Eze With Rare Partnership
To borrow the truism preached by Argentina’s World Cup winning analyst Matías Manna: “You can’t analyze the game individually. The game is in the relationships between players.” Arteta was forced to turn to a very unfamiliar partnership.
In place of Eze and without the natural replacements of Ødegaard or Mikel Merino, Arteta turned to Kai Havertz. The versatile German had only started two previous matches alongside Viktor Gyökeres; two wins in the space of four days against Kairat and Leeds United back in January.
The physical profile of Havertz and Gyökeres should have offered Arsenal more threat from those all-important set pieces but City defended the few dead balls swung into their area admirably. Aside from a triple chance in the seventh minute, Havertz was almost entirely anonymous, while Gyökeres failed to take a single shot throughout the entire course of the contest.
The issue for Arsenal was getting the ball to this front pairing: The Gunners simply couldn’t find a way through City’s daring press.
As Eze sullenly watched on, slumping deeper and deeper into his hooded jacket on the substitutes’ bench at Wembley, City capitalized upon Arsenal’s collective lack of composure to run out deserved 2–0 winners.
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This article was originally published on www.si.com as Why Eberechi Eze Didn’t Play for Arsenal vs. Man City in Carabao Cup Final.
