Players, management, and fans of Arsenal Football Club are celebrating this morning following their success at Wembley in the FA Cup final, marking the beginning of the club’s next nine years without a trophy.
The victory in the competition saw the team lift their first piece of silverware since 2005 and marks the start of a brand new era of quarter-final cup exits, fourth place in the league and the now traditional February capitulation.
Speaking from the team hotel before today’s open top bus parade, manager Arsene Wenger said: “I’ve always said qualifying for the champions league is as good as a trophy, but no-one seemed to agree with me so it’s nice to finally get our hands on a real cup.
“The pressure has been building for a few years now, but this win means we start our run of mediocrity in all competitions from the start again. And fans won’t have to wait long. It will all start with a loss in the community shield at the beginning of next season.”
Previous to this nine year drought, Arsenal had won many competitions under the stewardship of Mr Wenger, and in the ‘03-’04 season went the whole league campaign unbeaten.
Since then however, he has built teams that have been, on one hand, full of talent and potential, but on the other, full of Sebastien Squillaci and Nicklas Bendtner. But fans will now forgive all that has gone in the last nine years and blindly back this current crop of players, dubbed ‘The Unremarkables’ for the majority of the next decade, convincing themselves League Cup qualification for the 54th consecutive season is a mark of success.
Undeterred by yesterday’s win, Wenger has promised to ignore this blip in form and go back to losing ways citing ‘a new era of football for the opposition fans’ as his motivation.
“Manchester United employed David Moyes for the benefit of the whole country,” he explained, “and if we can give Piers Morgan a heart attack through our below average competition performances, we will be doing everyone a favour.”
