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Arsenal in the League Cup 3rd Round

  • thelimerickgooner
  • Sep 25, 2024
  • 9 min read

Intro


Arsenal take on Bolton Wanderers in the 3rd Round of the League Cup tonight. It's a competition that Arsenal have won just twice before, in 1987 and 1993. It's a cup that seems like it's had about 115 different sponsors over the years - it was called the Littlewoods Challenge Cup when Arsenal won it in 1987 and the Coca-Cola Cup in 1993. We've had Worthington's, Carling and Capital One Cups in the mean time, before landing on it's latest iteration - the Carabao Cup. To some fans, it might also be known as the Mickey Mouse Cup. But that's very often determined by your clubs success (or lack thereof) within the competition.


Regardless, we've arrived at the beginning of another cup campaign in the new season. Everybody starts off hopeful of a decent cup run. For Arsenal and us fans, it's no different.


So, in celebration of such a momentous time in the season, I thought I'd put together all the facts, figures, trivia and tidbits that you need to know ahead of the games tonight. And trust me, some of this stuff you absolutely need to know!


Let's get to it!





The Opposition


  • Bolton Wanderers, once a Premier League mainstay, currently find themselves in League One. They finished 3rd in the division last season but then missed out on promotion after losing the play-off final to Oxford United.

  • Fans of a certain age will remember Bolton as a once solid Premier League outfit. A couple of PL campaigns in the 1990's were followed by 11 consecutive top flight seasons between 2001 and 2012.

  • They were pretty successful in the early and mid-2000's. Bolton achieved 4 consecutive top 8 finishes in the league, they reached a League Cup final in 2004 and twice reached the knockout stages of the UEFA Cup. Their 2007-08 European run included a 2-2 draw away to Bayern Munich and an aggregate victory over Atletico Madrid.

  • Anyone who has been a fan of the recent Barclaysmen trend on social media knows that Bolton had some quintessential Barclaysmen in their time - Jay-Jay Okocha, Youri Djorkaeff, Stelios Giannakopoulos, Kevin Nolan, Kevin Davies, Ivan Campo. The list could go on. Plenty of names here that caused Arsenal more than a few problems back in the days when the Gunners didn't perform very well when travelling up north.



  • However, it's a much different Bolton Wanderers these days. Two relegations in five seasons saw the club competing in League One by 2016. There's been financial difficulties, administration and the threat of expulsion from the Football League and possible extinction in recent years. Safe to say, their fans have been through it all in a relatively short period of time.

  • The current side are managed by Ian Evatt. The former defender spent the majority of his playing career in the Football League, making well over 500 appearances for 6 different clubs. He did, however, play in every match of Blackpool's solitary Premier League campaign in 2010-11. In just the second game of the season, Evatt was sent off 30 minutes into a clash with Arsenal at the Emirates. Arsenal went on to win 6-0.

  • Bolton haven't started this season particularly well. They sit 19th in League One, with just 2 wins so far in the league. They've beaten Mansfield Town and Shrewsbury Town to reach this stage of the League Cup.



A League Cup 3rd Round History Lesson


As I mentioned earlier, Arsenal have won the League Cup twice before, in 1987 and 1993. The second of those triumphs came during the inaugural Premier League season - the English top flight having been rebranded from 1992-93. So I thought it's a natural cutoff point as I looked back through some stats and facts about Arsenal in the League Cup. I know, I know... football existed before the Premier League. But 32 seasons worth of stats is still quite a lot to go on...


  • In the last 32 seasons, Arsenal have lost just four times at the 3rd Round stage of the League Cup. All four of those defeats occurred at home - vs Ipswich Town in 2000, Sunderland in 2002, Southampton in 2014 and Brighton in 2022.

  • In the first four seasons of the PL era, Arsenal entered the League Cup from the 2nd Round. From 1996-97, teams competing in European football entered at the 3rd Round and all other Premier League teams entered at the 2nd Round. Not only that, but the first couple of rounds of the League Cup were played over two legs up until as recently as 2000-01. Single legged rounds also featured replays in the event of a drawn game until penalty shoot-outs were introduced in the mid-90's. Imagine the fixture chaos if that was still the case today?

  • All that considered, Arsenal played in several two-legged, early round ties in the League Cup in the early PL era. We never lost any such tie. The Gunners didn't enter the competition at the 2nd Round stage between 1996 and 2021. This streak was broken due to our lack of European football in 2021-22. Although it was a nice night out, thumping West Brom 6-0 at The Hawthorns.



  • Arsenal have played out 3 draws in the League Cup 3rd Round since 1992. The first of these came in October 1996, when the Gunners needed a late Ian Wright goal to level things away to Stoke City. This being the time when replays were utilised, the sides met again 3 weeks later. Arsenal won the replay 5-2.

  • The other two 3rd Round draws in this period saw Arsenal progress on penalties. The first came in 2003, when Arsenal win the shootout 9-8 after a 1-1 draw with Rotherham United (this is the entire game and shootout, if you have a couple hours spare). Ten years later, Arsenal again progressed on spot-kicks, this time at the expense of West Brom. The Gunners won 4-2 on pens after a 1-1 draw.







The Youth Cup?


The League Cup has very often been used by the bigger clubs as a means to rotate their squads during a busy time of the season. With league campaigns underway and European football to think about, the League Cup is sometimes dismissed by managers, or indeed fans. Why risk your big names in the fourth most important competition of the season? Some fringe players are given a chance and, often, youth is given the time to shine.

Arsenal under Arsene Wenger was a prime example of this. You could name a pretty decent squad based on players who made their debuts in the League Cup under Wenger. Ashley Cole, Cesc Fabregas, Robin Van Persie, Emi Martinez, Wojciech Szczesny and Hector Bellerin all took their first steps in senior football through the League Cup.



Others like Seb Larsson, Nicklas Bendtner, Matthew Upson, Fabrice Muamba, Alex Iwobi and Jeremie Aliadiere went on to have solid football careers that started when given the opportunity in the League Cup.

In recent seasons, we've perhaps seen fewer youth academy players get such chances than we became accustomed to in Wenger's time. Still, Emile Smith Rowe and Gabriel Martinelli received their first starts for Arsenal in this competition.



There's every chance that we'll see guys like Ethan Nwaneri and Miles Lewis-Skelly make their full debuts against Bolton tonight. Our goalkeeper for this game could be any one of three teenagers who supposedly make up the goalie options tonight, with David Raya potentially rested and new signing Neto being cup-tied.

It's a great opportunity for a young player to make mark. Some have done so with great success in an Arsenal shirt before. Jeremie Aliadiere scored 4 times en route to the final in 2007, which included a great performance in a 6-3 win over Liverpool at Anfield. Cesc Fabregas became our youngest ever goalscorer when he netted against Wolves in 2003. Carlos Vela bagged a hat-trick on his full debut against Sheffield United in 2008.



Let's hope that the current crop of Arsenal youngsters can follow in the footsteps of some of those aforementioned players and not so much this next group I'm about to tell you about...



First Impressions Matter

It doesn't always work out for youngsters being given their shot at first team football. The nerves, the sense of anticipation, the adrenaline - it can cause even seasoned professionals to slip up. What chance does a teenager have really? Here's just a handful of examples where an Arsenal youngster didn't exactly seize their opportunity...


  • Jason Crowe: the 19-year old made his Arsenal debut in a 3rd round tie against Birmingham City in 1997. With the game gone to extra-time, Crowe was subbed on for Lee Dixon, adding some fresh legs to the Arsenal side. Within less than a minute, the young fullback executed a poorly timed, kinda high tackle on Birmingham's Martin O'Connor. It was a straight red card, clocked at just 33 seconds after coming on the field. It was, and possibly still is, the fastest debut sending off in English football. Jason Crowe went on to play just 2 more times for Arsenal before being sold to Portsmouth for £1 million in 1999. Portsmouth were managed by a certain Tony Pulis at the time...



  • John Halls: Another 19-year old making his debut in a 3rd round tie. Unfortunately for John Halls, the similarities with Jason Crowe didn't end there. In a clash with Man United in 2001, both sides fielded much weaker teams than you'd imagine considering the intense rivalry at the time. However, both teams had played League matches barely 24 hours earlier so rotation was the order of the day. A first half hat-trick from Sylvain Wiltord had Arsenal in control by the time Halls was subbed on. His debut lasted all of 22 minutes as he received two yellow cards as well as his marching orders. Halls was off. After just 2 more Arsenal appearances and a couple of loan spells, Halls was off permanently as he moved to Tony Pulis' Stoke City in 2003. Now, if I had nickel for every time a defender was sent off on his Arsenal debut in the League Cup 3rd round at the age of 19 before being bought by Tony Pulis two years later... you know the rest... Halls doesn't exactly fit the ogre-like aesthetic we more commonly associate with Stoke though. He went on to become a fashion model after retiring and even walked the catwalk at Milan Fashion Week.



  • Rhys Weston: A Welsh defender, Weston made just 3 senior appearances for Arsenal. He lost all 3. These included two League Cup defeats - a 4th round penalty shootout defeat to Middlesbrough in 1999 and a 3rd round loss to Ipswich Town the following season. Weston made his Premier League debut on the final day of the season in 2001. A heavily rotated Arsenal side, with nothing to play for in the league and a UEFA Cup Final to look forward to that week, went down 4-2 away to Newcastle. At least Weston got a wonderful view of Alan Shearer's 300th career goal. That's something. To be fair, he went on to have a decent time at Cardiff City, climbing the divisions from League Two to the Championship. He also won 7 caps for Wales. More than I have...



  • Igors Stepanovs: Ok, he wasn't exactly a youth player when he made his Arsenal debut against Ipswich Town in 2000. But he did taste defeat. Unlike the others above, Stepanovs also scored a goal on his debut! Signed as cover for the injured Tony Adams (the story of his transfer hilariously recalled by Ray Parlour here), Stepanovs went on to make 31 appearances for Arsenal. He played in a run of PL games in the middle of that season that began with a 6-1 win over Leicester and culminated with a 6-1 defeat to Man United. He didn't feature much more after that. The Latvian did, however, play 6 times during the title winning 2001-02 season. Which was not enough to claim a medal... but he did have a place on the bench the night Arsenal clinched the title at Old Trafford! Redemption for Igors after that 6-1 defeat? Probably not... The centre-back did go on to play 100 games for Latvia - the same amount Harry Kane has played for England. And Stepanovs never lost a Euros Final, never mind two of them! Take that!



In Conclusion


I hope you've enjoyed the journey we've taken to get here. If, indeed, you are still here. I know it's a lot. But you can't say you didn't learn something. I know my appreciation for the League Cup has increased with every paragraph. Where else would you get history making red cards, record breaking goals, drubbings of lower league sides by a bunch of kids AND a worldy of a volley from a Frenchman against your biggest rivals?

It's the League Cup. Embrace it. Enjoy it. But don't forget to call it a Mickey Mouse Cup when we get knocked out.



 
 
 

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