The levels of content are, quite frankly, off the charts. Content-wise, Arsenal have come to Lisbon, eaten and left no crumbs. Katie McCabe sliding on her belly along the dressing room floor through a pool of champagne. Alex Scott and Jess Glynne in their retro tops. Managing to drop the F-bomb on live teatime television, not once but twice. McCabe recreating the moment she threw a ball at Chloe Kelly’s head during a Women’s Super League game, only this time with the Champions League trophy.
And then, in their more reflective moments, thoughts turn to the past. To where they came from. To the journey, those who came, and those who couldn’t make it all the way. Laia Codina wraps herself in the Catalan flag. Leah Williamson and her father share an embrace. Beth Mead thinks about her late mother. Kelly reminisces about her academy days, getting the train from Finsbury Park to Potters Bar with Lotte Wubben-Moy. Because nobody ever gets themselves to a Champions League final. You are delivered, like stones in a river, by the forces and influences that shaped you.
In retrospect it all makes perfect narrative sense, perhaps even feels preordained. But in truth there is still a certain element of shock to be processed, at how the dominant team in women’s football, coming into the final on the back of 18 goals in their four knockout games, were stifled so comprehensively on the biggest stage. Really only a handful of people sawArsenal’s 1-0 win over Barcelonacoming, and pretty much all of them were employees of Arsenal Football Club.
How did they do it? Partly tactics and partly tone. While Arsenal were aware that Barcelona would dominate possession, a tilted press flooded the central areas with bodies and sought to pin Barcelona to one side of the pitch. You can’t ever really stop Barcelona playing but you can slow them down, frustrate them, force them into lower-percentage options: long shots, hero dribbles, crosses from wide. The prolific centre-forward Ewa Pajor was restricted to 24 touches and zero shots on target.
The point at which it became clear Arsenal’s game plan was beginning to bear fruit came about 20 minutes in, when the great Alexia Putellas – finally losing her patience at the speed of Barcelona’s buildup – dropped deep into the heart of defence to receive the ball. With all her passing lanes closed off, she instead attempted a long harmless ball to Clàudia Pina that went straight through to the goalkeeper.
Outwitting the greatest team in the history of women’s football: not a bad scalp for a coach who looked – as one social media user put it – like she was taking Year 4 PE. But in her sartorial choice of casual club tracksuit, in her simple concise messaging, in her brief and emotionally restrained pre-match team talk, Renée Slegers was sending her players a clear cue. Beating Barcelona isn’t some epic biblical quest. It’s your job. It’s business. It’s what we do.
And in a profession seemingly overpopulated with chancers and charlatans, thespians and gurus, Slegers stands out amid some of her coaching peers for her impressive lack of flourish, her discretion, her ability to give a straight question a straight answer. Perhaps this explains why a lot of fans and pundits were a little slow to recognise her gifts after she took over from Jonas Eidevall in October. Perhaps it even explains why it took the Arsenal board so long to give her the job on a full-time basis. But within the four walls of that dressing room there have never been any doubts.
And so Arsenal’s first task this summer is to commit to Slegers’ vision, and above all to give her the players she needs. Arsenal showed here that their first 13 or 14 players bear comparison with the very best in Europe. But as their recent WSL defeats have shown, they lack the supreme strength in depth that sustains a genuine title challenge, that allows Slegers rotation options, that can weather a winter injury crisis.
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It is also a squad that will need rebuilding before long: of the 15 Arsenal players who took to the pitch on Saturday, not one of them was aged under 25. Kim Little is 34; Steph Catley 31; Mead and Caitlin Foord 30; McCabe, Stina Blackstenius and Mariona Caldentey 29. There is a huge amount of potential in the likes of Michelle Agyemang, Rosa Kafaji, Katie Reid and Teyah Goldie. But at some point, you have to take the leap of faith and give them a run of games.
Being champions of Europe comes with certain fringe benefits. It makes the club a far more appealing prospect to new signings, turns Arsenal overnight into a destination club for the world’s best young players, not just the ones that Chelsea didn’t fancy. And of course the content also helps here. As Saturday night turned to Sunday morning the laughter and songs that spilled out into the wilds of social media were a reminder that the best Arsenal teams are fun: fun to watch, fun to be around, fun to play for.
But of course the finer details of Arsenal’s golden future can wait for now. There is a time for looking forward and there is a time for looking back. And on Monday, at the Emirates Stadium, there will be a time for looking out at the crowds and the smoke: a team and a public and a trophy brought together for the first time. After all, there’s no point in climbing a mountain unless you’re going to enjoy the view.