Arsenal have no more excuses after PSG defeat lays bare Andrea Berta's summer transfer challenge | OneFootball

New sporting director Berta must give Mikel Arteta the squad to challenge for the Premier League next season

For Arsenal this has been a season defined by wasted opportunities and littered with what-ifs; by red cards, injuries and forgetting the credit card PIN in January. But when Mikel Arteta reflects on the campaign this summer, he will not find a night with greater concentration of nearly-moments than this one.

PSG had a few “ifs” of their own and were too good anyway. Across the course of the tie they attacked with a different energy and aura, scoring three fine goals — from Ousmane Dembele in London, as well as Fabian Ruiz and Achraf Hakimi here. They could have had several more in this second leg alone, with Khvicha Kvaratskhelia clipping the post and Vitinha watching a poor penalty saved.

Arteta is desperate for a striker to give his side more cutting edge

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And so it is the French giants, reborn, reshaped and riding a youthful wave, who charge on to Munich with a 3-1 triumph, for a final against Inter Milan that feels refreshing for being between two teams not hugely fancied at the start of the season, nor serial champions on this stage. Inter have lifted the trophy once in 60 years, PSG never at all. It will be Europe’s best team against one that has just emerged from maybe its greatest ever two-legged tie.

“Sometimes you have to lose a few in order to win and overcome setbacks to grow as a player and as a group,” Rice, below, said afterwards, but they are beginning to stack up for this group and next season now really does feel one for which there can be no excuses. This is a PSG side, remember, only two seasons into a fresh project under Luis Enrique and not yet 12 months on from losing Kylian Mbappe to Real Madrid.

Missed opportunities

Scores of stickers plastered all over the 16th Arrondissement on matchday stressed the sentiment behind this fundamentally different PSG team, each framing an individual player but above the slogan “Ensemble” — Together.

It is no secret that PSG are better for having sidelined their obsession with star power, but it was still surprising to hear the horse’s mouth acknowledge as much quite so freely in the build-up to this game.

Hakimi, who played for years with the likes of Lionel Messi, Mbappe and Neymar and is, presumably, still on nodding terms with all three, was tossed the question in the pre-match press conference and decided not to flat bat it away. “[The club] tried to build a team more than star players,” the full-back said. “I think that is the key for this new Paris Saint-Germain. The collective is more important than individualities.”

Declan Rice heads wide under pressure from Marquinhos

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Since the turn of the year they have been exceptional and what they had been able to do to Arsenal in the first half-hour at the Emirates last week felt almost freakish. Arteta’s side have not been so comprehensively outplayed in years — essentially since they became good. Rice admitted his team had been “spooked” by Dembele’s fourth-minute goal, but the visitors’ dominance owed far more to their brilliance than Arsenal’s shrinking into themselves. Another 30 minutes like that at any stage here would surely be enough to kill the tie.

The Parc des Princes put on a magnificent pre-match show, blurring the lines between confected Parisian cool and the organic thunder of the Virage Auteuil. There were tifos to shame Arsenal’s church fête effort and a firework and light show that somehow worked even against a clear blue late evening sky.

Yet Arsenal, unlike on their own patch, came out to play, suffocating the home side in a dominant opening salvo that was punctuated by the hat-trick of missed opportunities that, even in the moment, you sensed would be costly.

“After 20 minutes it should have been 3-0,” Arteta said. “There is something extra you need to go your way in this competition and it didn’t.” Thomas Partey’s return from suspension had been talked up as a potentially key difference from the first leg, but there was little mention of his long-throws. They looked a potent early weapon, at least until PSG captain Marquinhos abandoned marking duties and took personal responsibility for heading every one away.

Fabian Ruiz scores for PSG past Arsenal’s David Raya

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Later, Arteta would point to the Brazilian — who signed for PSG in 2013 and has been trying to win the Champions League without luck ever since — as an ideal role model for his team.

Perhaps it was the weight of those failures that fuelled PSG’s early skittishness. That, on nine minutes, Donnarumma, right, called for treatment on a feigned injury to slow the game was the ultimate compliment to Arsenal’s fast start.

The striker situation will surely now be addressed and Arteta will hope for a transformative, marquee addition

You could not hear the 2,000-odd Arsenal supporters penned into the away end but you could certainly spot them, the red and white scarves handed out by the club to ticket-holders twirling above their heads. Arsenal’s position, trailing 1-0, though, was always fragile. William Saliba and Myles Lewis-Skelly both coughed up golden chances, the latter setting the tone for what was by some margin the most difficult night of his short senior career. PSG squandered those, but needed asking only thrice, Ruiz’s wonderful touch and strike not losing much of its aesthetic beauty for taking a deflection off Saliba.

Really, from that moment the tie felt done, even if there were happenings on which Arsenal might, on another day, have hung a comeback: David Raya’s save from Vitinha’s penalty at the end of a long game of chicken, Saka’s finish to reduce a three-goal deficit to two with 14 minutes still to play. There again, beating Donnarumma twice ultimately proved beyond the Gunners even across 180 minutes of the tie.

The Spaniard spoke, too, of the difference between the two sides coming in both boxes and the sight of the injured Kai Havertz and Gabriel Jesus consoling team-mates in front of the away end at full-time was a reminder of the striker problem that has ultimately cost Arsenal in the pursuit of silverware all season. In the four matches responsible for their cup exits — the Carabao Cup defeat to Newcastle, FA Cup exit to Manchester United and these two legs against PSG — Arsenal registered a combined expected goals tally of 13, but scored only twice.

There were tears at the final whistle, most agonisingly from young Lewis-Skelly, and more inside the dressing room. They will dry quickly, but the pain is unlikely to go anywhere fast.

Taking care of business

Sunday’s trip to Anfield looks horribly uninviting for a team who gave everything emotionally here and have been stretched physically for months. Liverpool wobbled at Chelsea last weekend having been crowned champions, but you imagine that might be the hangover out of the system. In front of a home crowd, they will be keen to emphasise the gap between the best and the rest in English football this term.

Andrea Berta, Arsenal’s sporting director must deliver new players this summer

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Whether Arsenal finish even as runners-up is not yet certain. Having, understandably, taken their eye off the ball in the league around huge European fixtures in recent weeks, Arteta’s men have slipped back towards the pack.

Whatever the table eventually says, though, the Gunners have been the second-best team in the country for the third year in a row. Bridging the gap to the leaders remains the same challenge going into this summer as it was when chasing Manchester City in each of the past two.

The striker situation will surely now be addressed and Arteta will hope for a transformative, marquee addition of the type Rice became when joining from West Ham for £105million in 2023. Alexander Isak remains the dream signing, but Newcastle are unlikely to sell. Benjamin Sesko and Viktor Gyökeres are other options in the powerhouse, goal-getter mode.

Rice’s evolution as a No8 has changed the complexion of Arsenal’s midfield and it is at the base where Arteta appears certain to strengthen next, with Martin Zubimendi expected to join from Real Sociedad. How much cash is left after those moves remains to be seen, but a new left-winger is also on the wishlist. There will be other less showy additions: a No2 goalkeeper and maybe a new centre-back, if Jakub Kiwior is sold.

Jorginho looks to be on his way to Brazil, but there are murmurings that Partey may get a new deal. Kieran Tierney and Oleksandr Zinchenko should lead an exodus of overstocked left-backs.

Alexander Isak is Arsenal’s dream signing but Newcastle will not let him go without a fight

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The task for new sporting director Andrea Berta in his first window will be to give Arteta a squad that is good enough to win the league — that simply was not the case this term. The number of injuries to key players has been shocking, but Arsenal’s inability to cover for them less so. Reaching a Champions League semi-final with Mikel Merino up front is quite the achievement, but was never likely to see them through.

Assuming he is given the tools, there will be no hiding place for Arteta either. There have been premature grumblings this season — largely quieted by the ecstasy of those two nights against Real Madrid — about the 43-year-old’s leadership, but most supporters remain fully behind the manager and understanding of the circumstances around this campaign. Whether they will be quite so forgiving of another trophy-less season seems a stretch. It feels, too, like Arsenal might have only one more year before losing at least one of the key parts of this team, say perhaps Saliba to Real Madrid.

The Gunners have players good enough to win trophies, including the Champions League — but they are not there as a team yet.