Chelsea meeting Arsenal for the FA Cup is about as normal as things get, even if this season’s final is anything but normal.
Just as it was with the semifinals, there will be no fans at Wembley and there is going to be the less of the trademark pageantry that has come to be associated with the world’s oldest cup competition.
That’s not to say that victory will not be any less sweet – as we saw with Liverpool lifting the English Premier League title at an empty Anfield early last month.
The Reds had waited 30 years to be crowned champions of England of course – and becoming world and European champions along the way did not diminish that feat – while winning the FA Cup lives in recent memory for both the Gunners and the Blues.
Chelsea won it two years ago, an Eden Hazard penalty enough to beat Jose Mourinho’s Manchester United. Arsenal, the record 13-time winners, last added to their tally in 2017 with a win over Saturday’s opponents.
Not strangers
The teams are no strangers to one another, last meeting in a showpiece last season with the UEFA Europa League final in at the Olympic Stadium in Baku, Azerbaijan, where Chelsea ran out 4-1 winners.
While Baku was the furthest you might expect the Londoners to meet in a final, this coronavirus-delayed season is certainly the latest they will meet in a final.
Wembley in August is ordinarily the time for the FA Community Sheild, the English season’s curtain raiser. Not this year, but then it has been a year that has defied expectations in lots of ways.
Club legend Frank Lampard replaced the departing Maurizio Sarri at Stamford Bridge and he entered a club that was about to be banned from transfers and losing star player Eden Hazard to Real Madrid.
It was safe to say people were not going to hold him to the same bar as recent managers.
“Of course, Lampard has to be treated differently because Chelsea have lost their superstar,” Sky Sports pundit Jamie Redknapp said ahead of the season.
It should be noted that not only is the former Liverpool player a pundit but he also happens to be the cousin of the Chelsea boss.
“If you think Lampard’s team should finish in the top four and win a cup, you’re deluded,” Redknapp warned.
“It’s completely wrong, you can’t have that expectation.
“The expectation will be to finish in the top four, but they’ve got to be realistic. I think there’ll be moments in the season where it will be a struggle, because of the Hazard effect.
“It doesn’t matter what manager you have – [Pep] Guardiola, [Jose] Mourinho, anyone – they are going to struggle without that quality of player.
“But if they were to finish in the top four that would be an amazing season, considering the transfer embargo and everything else.”
First trophy?
Well, the top four has been secured, and now Lampard has the chance to win his first trophy as a manager – adding a fifth FA Cup winners’ medal after four as a player with Chelsea.
Bearing in mind that Redknapp was not the only one pleading caution for a manager who had only one season with Derby County on his CV and the Chelsea boss stands on the edge of a very good debut season.
They had to beat Liverpool and Leicester City along the way and that was before beating Manchester United in the semifinal, finally ending a run of three defeats to Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s side this season.
Their opponents on Saturday have also had their ups and downs this season but they end it with the opportunity for it to be classed as a success.
Marcelo Bielsa’s Leeds United, who have been crowned Championship winners and secured their return to the Premier League next season, were first up before a tricky away trip to fellow Premier League side Bournemouth.
Then came a potential banana skin and another away day on England’s south coast with a visit to League One Portsmouth prior to a return to Premier League opposition in this season’s surprise package Sheffield United at Bramall Lane in the quarterfinals.
Victory there set up a semifinal with holders Manchester City, and a reunion for Gunners boss Mikel Arteta with the man he had so ably assisted at the Etihad, Pep Guardiola.
Needless to say Arsenal overcame the odds with a 2-0 win at Wembley to set up the chance to check Chelsea’s chase for a trophy and seek revenge for that night in Baku over a year ago.
Arteta was not the manager then, of course. Just as Lampard replaced Sarri – who had won the trophy and finished third, to give an indication of the bar at Stamford Bridge – Arteta has come in for Unai Emery, who replaced Arsene Wenger.
The club turned to another former midfielder.
The big difference being that while Sarri for Lampard was decided in the summer, the Emery era at the Emirates was only extinguished in November following a run of poor results.
That culminated in home defeat to Eintracht Frankfurt in the Europa League.
Arteta was appointed in December and he has seen an uptick in form from his players, with this fourth FA Cup final in seven years giving him a chance to lift the FA Cup for the first time as a manager, which he won twice as a player with Arsenal.
Arteta has managed Arsenal 27 times, winning 15, drawing six and losing six. A 16th win would be another step in the right direction as Arsenal look to map out their post-Wenger future.
More importantly it might help the club keep its star players such as Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, the man who fired them back to Wembley.
Frank Lampard Photo: VCG
