Arsenal complete hat-trick of victories against Chelsea in the FA Cup Final.

Arsenal complete hat-trick of victories against Chelsea in the FA Cup Final.

For 2002 and 2017 read 2020. Chelsea should really stop meeting Arsenal like this. For the third time in recent years Arsenal beat Chelsea in the FA Cup Final. They say familiarity breeds contempt but this never-ending saga between fierce London rivals has well and truly completed the trilogy. In the end it was all very straightforward and easy for Arsenal but there must come a point in a club's history when even the most masochistic soul needs to get away from all the torture. Chelsea are probably sick and tired of seeing the same red shirts so maybe this was one Cup Final too far for them.

Yesterday Arsenal met Chelsea in one of the quietest and strangest FA Cup Finals of all time. By the time the referee blew the whistle for full time at Wembley even the most vocal of pigeons and gulls had gone home no doubt disgusted by the lack of any human presence. But the harsh realities of modern times meant that this Cup Final was never likely to be renowned as both atmospheric and vociferous. The global coronavirus pandemic had ensured that the plug had to be taken out of the sound system and the overall product would be wholly diluted by circumstances that none of us could have anticipated.

In the old days of course the FA Cup Final was designed exclusively for the masses, vast hordes of football supporters descending on the national stadium from all four corners of Britain on luxury coaches. On arrival at the old Wembley they would twirl their scarves, flaunt their comical banners and placards before filling the terraces with an explosion of loyalty, fervent club allegiance and fruity messages to members of the family who couldn't make it on the day.

The Cup Final was one of those truly democratic days of the sporting year where no stone was left unturned. You would fork out hard-earned and considerable sums of money just for the privilege of standing or sitting at Wembley because you knew that this would be your day of achievement. You used to wake up at some unearthly hour on Saturday morning and then be subjected to both sets of players and managers from the respective Cup Finalists, following them from the hotels the players had occupied for the night, through breakfast before watching them swap warm banter and bonhomie on their coaches.

But yesterday was starkly and startlingly different, so different in fact that it could hardly be further removed from the conventional proceedings of a Cup Final. The blunt truth was there were no fans, no supporters, no songs, no chants and nothing identifiably reminiscent of a normal Cup Final day. The day was singular, unique, historic, weird and slightly spooky. The occasion itself reminded you of an undemanding training exercise, even a pre-season friendly with nothing to suggest that we should ever have taken it seriously.

And yet the formalities had to be observed, protocols carried out and hands sanitised before the match because nobody would ever be able to live with their conscience if they hadn't. In fact this was the FA Cup Final that missed out on its regular appointment in the second week of May because of the intervention of fate. So here we were on the first of August and our body clocks had been wrecked by an unavoidable illness which turned into a horrendous worldwide disease.

So it was that a London derby was placed before our eyes and yet again another repeat FA Cup Final. It could only have worked out this way since we were witnessing something completely out of the ordinary. Only Arsenal and Chelsea could have known that they wouldn't have travel that far out of their way for an FA Cup Final that was next door for them. Geographically of course both were ideally suited for the day itself in which case both should have enjoyed the luxury of a lie in and a gentle tea and toast in bed.

Still, once again Arsenal, having already beaten their opponents in 2002 at the Millennium Stadium and another face-off in 2017 at Wembley, must have been reasonably confident of victory once again. After all, Arsenal have now won the FA Cup a record-breaking 14 times which implies that they must be doing something right. Surely they couldn't be beaten now and Chelsea had better beware because the same treatment would be meted out to them again.

Seasoned campaigners at this level, Arsenal approached this game rather like an important business meeting with a portfolio of impressive successes and maybe a very blase air about them. This is not to suggest for a moment that Chelsea were underestimated at any point but there may have been an air of swagger and presumptuousness about Arsenal that led you to believe that this would be just another day at the office for the Gunners. And so it eventually proved.

For just a minute or two you were taken back to your first childhood FA Cup Final, your earliest and fondest recollection, Bertie Mee's well-disciplined Arsenal including the likes of Eddie Kelly, Peter Storey, George Graham, George Armstrong, Frank Mclintock and the lanky, long hair of Charlie George were a team of regular entertainers, mischievous music hall characters and Double winners in 1971 when decimalisation changed everybody's penny in their pockets.

Roll forward 49 years later and Mikel Arteta's Arsenal were a side of worldly and cosmopolitan artists and artisans, a side of undoubted pedigree and flair but still yet to discover their true worth and status. After one of the club's most underwhelming seasons in the Premier League where Arsenal had to beat Chelsea to qualify for a place in Europe this was an Arsenal team still patiently waiting for their moment in the sun.

That they succeeded in their objective of clinching a place in next season's Europa League is probably much more a testament to Arteta and his backroom coaching staff than anything else. When Arsenal stopped the seemingly unstoppable Manchester City in the FA Cup semi final at Wembley it felt as if Arsenal were about to put their foot on the accelerator and just head for the open country without a care in the world. A 14th FA Cup beckoned for the North London outfit and who knew that it would be so easy? Good old Arsenal we're proud to say your name to quote one of the club's old anthems.

For Chelsea and Frank Lampard their new manager this was all about a season of pleasant discoveries, solid consolidation and totally unexpected achievements. Of course they have now reached next season's Champions League which maybe exceeds all of their expectations. But Chelsea have been refreshing and enthralling, an attractive blend of young English players with a reliable backbone of more experienced players just to keep them on their toes.

Players such as Callum- Hudson Odoi, Mason Mount, Tammy Abraham have been supplemented by the elegant craftsmanship of the brilliant Ross Barkley, a now complete article at Chelsea after learning his apprenticeship at Everton. Chelsea have surprised everybody with their admirable insistence on the short passing game, full of tricks, flicks, cunning and subtlety. Their game is beautifully composed and designed with all of the correct principles from a former Chelsea player who did like to knit Chelsea's attacking football together` with all of the prettiest embroideries.

Yesterday evening Lampard's Chelsea went off like a vintage steam train, brimming with intelligent angles, clever, snappy passing movements in tight and confined spaces without ever losing their way. Arsenal were rattled and clearly taken back. When Chelsea took a very early lead against Arsenal there must have been a thought deeply lodged at the back of their minds that something would simply crack followed by subsidence at the back. There would be no caving in this time against Chelsea.

Still there was a cool intelligence about Chelsea and when Kurt Zouma, the leggy Antonio Rudiger loped forward adventurously and Reece James overlapped shrewdly on one flank, Chelsea began to find alarming gaps in an otherwise drum-tight Arsenal defence. The wonderfully artistic Jorginho was ably complemented by the excellent Mateo Kovacic with Marcos Alonso constantly cutting in from the wing in always dangerous positions. Significantly though Chelsea were missing the highly influential Willian, a Brazilian sorcerer who would prove the most crucial loss on the day.

But Arsenal were clearly roused by early setbacks, the Arteta oracle working its magic from the moment Chelsea took the lead. For the rest of the first half, Chelsea's profound impact on the game would dwindle, drift away and eventually disappear. Then there would be a wholesale disintegration as the blue ocean liner would lose its moorings altogether. When Chelsea disentangled the trap Leeds United had trapped them into 50 years ago in the FA Cup Final it was almost a welcome relief .

Now though there was no Billy Bremner to breath fire onto them and Eddie Gray seemed to lose his compass on the wing. Yesterday once Arsenal had pinned them onto the canvas Chelsea were out on their feet. Blue Chelsea shirts were dropping down to the ground with injuries and a sending off. It would prove the end of the road for a briefly threatening Chelsea team with now tiring limbs and a longing for some Mediterranean beach.

When the likes of the sturdy Rob Holding, the occasionally unpredictable David Luiz and the energetically enterprising Hector Bellerin began to open up large areas of unattended spaces in the middle of the pitch, Arsenal glided into them willingly as if the key to the door had been found immediately. Rather like Chelsea, Arsenal were naturally expressive, driving forward at every opportunity and playing the kind of football that English coaches from many decades ago would have thought impossible. There was an easy going spontaneity and delicate liquidity about some of Arsenal's passing which was an instant throwback to the glory years of Arsene Wenger.

There was Dani Ceballos always creative, permanently comfortable on the ball, a playmaker in the noble traditions of a Barcelona team who had always known the right way to play. Granit Xhaka, once spiky and temperamental, established a cutting edge in midfield that would never be broken. Earlier on in the season, Xhaka threw his toys out of the pram, storming off the pitch amid a barrage of booing and barracking from disgruntled Arsenal fans. Now Xhaka was scheming, hunting and hungrily pursuing all possibilities, a player of drive, passion and perfectly acceptable ambitions.

With half time approaching Arsenal, pushing Chelsea back into a hasty defensive retreat, were on the attacking warpath, all guns legally firing. Their football was truly a joy to behold. Pierre Emerick Aubemayang, now an exciting and vitally important asset for Arsenal, charged into the Chelsea penalty box and was wrestled down by a back pedalling Chelsea defence. Aubemayang calmly converted the penalty for Arsenal and the scores were level.

In the second half Chelsea came out obviously fired up and galvanised by their manager's half time pep talk. But despite some positive and neatly constructed football through the centre of the Wembley pitch Chelsea were still huffing and puffing to a large extent. Halfway through the second half Arsenal, finding yet another gear and wind, cranked up the pressure yet again. Hector Bellerin floated effortlessly into space again, ran almost logically finding the hugely talented Nicolas Pepe, whose speed and trickery had now left Chelsea in knots. Pepe moved the ball to Aubemayang and the French striker cut back inside his defender before chipping the ball simply beyond Chelsea's flailing goalkeeper Willy Caballero.

And so it was that the 2020 FA Cup Final had left us with a fitting dignity, a most civilised manner but nobody inside Wembley. It could hardly have been any other way. You privately found yourself hoping that this would never happen again because essentially the FA Cup Final is not the FA Cup Final without its fans and supporters.

What we had instead were those far fetched and hilarious moments that had to be seen to believed. There were the brazen advertisements for that Saudi airline forever flickering away beside the Wembley pitch. Finally, as if to leave most of us in uncontrollable hysterics, there were those astonishing, computer-generated images of countless football fans waving, giggling, laughing and pulling all manner of faces. It was almost a microcosm of Project Restart, football desperately searching for a way of appeasing the real fans who would normally have taken their seats on those empty Wembley bucket seats. How football will celebrate the return of its devoted supporters. What a day that'll be.