Arsenal reached their first final since 2020 after a 1-0 win over Chelsea in the Carabao Cup semi-final second leg. The victory marked Mikel Arteta\u2019s first success in a semi-final tie in front of supporters, six years after outwitting Pep Guardiola\u2019s Manchester City in an empty Wembley Stadium.<\/p>\n
Arteta had warned that \u201cFootball gives you another chance.\u201d The day before the game he declared his squad \u201cthe most exciting team in Europe.\u201d On a rain-soaked winter night in north London, in front of 60,000 fans, the match rarely matched that billing. As one observer put it, \u201cIt\u2019s very dangerous to shout,\u201d the legendary Manchester United manager Sir Matt Busby used to say, \u201cbecause in my profession every 24 hours can make you a fool.\u201d<\/p>\n
The contest was low on obvious thrills. Long-range efforts produced athletic saves, the midfields traded heavy challenges and Chelsea pushed late after a corner; Havertz finished a late breakaway that had started from that set piece but it came too late to change the outcome.<\/p>\n
Player ratings (Arsenal unless stated):
\nGK: Kepa Arrizabalaga \u2014 7.9: Had precious little to do but did it well.
\nRB: Jurri\u00ebn Timber \u2014 7.2: Drifted into midfield looking for influence without much success.
\nCB: William Saliba \u2014 7.2: Took a front-foot approach to marking Jo\u00e3o Pedro.
\nCB: Gabriel \u2014 7.7: Played with authority and clear positioning.
\nLB: Piero Hincapi\u00e9 \u2014 7.8: Fired one of the game’s few early shots.
\nCM: Eberechi Eze \u2014 6.7: Seemed to operate well within himself.
\nCM: Mart\u00edn Zubimendi \u2014 7.0: Favoured safer passes and possession consolidation.
\nCM: Declan Rice \u2014 7.7: Energetic across the pitch against his former club.
\nRW: Noni Madueke \u2014 6.2: Struggled to create after being closely tracked by Marc Cucurella.
\nST: Viktor Gy\u00f6keres \u2014 6.6: Limited involvement; scarce touches and one pass completed.
\nLW: Gabriel Martinelli \u2014 6.5: Dropped deep to create space and troubled Malo Gusto.
\nSUB: Kai Havertz (69′ for Gy\u00f6keres) \u2014 7.3: Improved the attacking threat.
\nSUB: Leandro Trossard (69′ for Madueke) \u2014 N\/A
\nSubs not used: David Raya (GK), Ben White, Cristhian Mosquera, Myles Lewis-Skelly, Riccardo Calafiori, Christian N\u00f8rgaard, Gabriei Jesus.<\/p>\n
Match statistics:
\nPossession: Arsenal 44% | Chelsea 56%
\nExpected Goals (xG): Arsenal 0.91 | Chelsea 0.68
\nTotal Shots: Arsenal 5 | Chelsea 14
\nShots on Target: Arsenal 2 | Chelsea 2
\nBig Chances: Arsenal 2 | Chelsea 1
\nPassing Accuracy: Arsenal 85% | Chelsea 90%
\nFouls Committed: Arsenal 14 | Chelsea 12
\nCorners: (as per match data)<\/p>\n
Arsenal advance to the final; Chelsea could not overturn the deficit despite late pressure.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Arsenal beat Chelsea 1-0 to reach their first final since 2020. Arteta won his first semi with fans.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6491,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[192,1381,1067],"tags":[1162,1305,1066],"class_list":["post-6492","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arsenal","category-arsenal-match-reports","category-carabao-cup","tag-analytics","tag-bench-selection","tag-carabao-cup"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6492","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6492"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6492\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6491"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6492"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6492"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6492"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}