Arsenal Look To Win The Europa League Without Henrikh Mkhitaryan

Arsenal play their first European final in 13 years tomorrow night when they take on Chelsea in the distant and unwelcoming venue of Baku. I’m sure there will be a welcome for the Arsenal fans who have somehow managed to make the almost 3,000 mile journey, but as a country Azerbaijan can hardly be called welcoming to our club or fans. We will have to do without Henrikh Mkhitaryan for the game because he didn’t feel safe travelling to a country that’s still technically at war with his homeland despite assurances from UEFA that it was safe for him to travel.

When you read up on the recent history between the two countries I have no doubt Mkhitaryan made the right decision and I’m sure it was helped by the veiled threat to him from the Azerbaijani ambassador to the UK. It has also been reported that Arsenal fans of Armenian lineage were refused visas and unable to enter the country for the game. There is only one reason UEFA chose Baku for the final, but their official line is the fans in Baku deserve to have the game played there and other countries have problems too. 

Of course we all know it’s got nothing to do with all the lovely oil money that makes Azerbaijan such an acceptable host for the final. Even besides the political climate there’s the problems fans of both sides have had trying to make their way to a city that just isn’t ready to cope with a large influx of fans. Arsenal had to return a third of their allocation of tickets while Chelsea returned two thirds of theirs despite both teams only getting 6,000 tickets each for the game. 

It’s an absolute disgrace that UEFA have decided to play the final in Baku, but at this stage that’s not going to change. The only protest open to Arsenal was to refuse to play, but I don’t think UEFA would have backed down and Chelsea would have been handed the trophy. It’s not a road the club were ever going to go down, but a part of me wishes they had the guts to stand up to UEFA and take the consequences.

However the prize of qualifying for next season’s Champions League was far too much for the club to turn their backs on. I have no doubt UEFA would have come up with further punishment than the €500,000 fine for not playing and I wouldn’t be surprised if we were chucked out of European football for a few seasons too if we had shown some backbone. I can’t say I’m glad we backed down, but I don’t see what real choice we had.

It means we’ll have to do without our joint third highest scorer this season and Mkhitaryan has also played more Europa League minutes than any other Arsenal player this season. While he hasn’t exactly set the world alight he also has the ability to have made a difference for us in the game. We’ll never know what that influence might have been though and we’ll just have to do without him.

Hopefully his absence can galvanise the rest of the players and they can go out and give that little bit extra that might be needed on the night. It’s a game which could go either way and any edge we can gain will be very welcome. 

That’s it for today.

See you tomorrow.