High on excuses and low on really big moments. That, in short, is the story of Arsenal’s season.

Mikel Arteta, the Arsenal manager, says his team were better than Paris Saint-Germain over two legs of their Champions League semi-final. They weren’t.

He says Gianluigi Donnarumma, the PSG goalkeeper, was the best player in the tie. He wasn’t.

He says Arsenal were the best team in the competition. They weren’t.

He says, in the Premier League, Arsenal were better over the last two seasons than Liverpool were this season. They weren’t. And even if they were then it’s irrelevant. Liverpool are champions and the points gap is conclusively and embarrassingly wide.

Arteta is not generally a delusional man. But as the disappointment of this busted season swirls, he is in danger of sounding like one.

High on excuses and low on really big moments. That, in short, is the story of Arsenal’s season

Mikel Arteta, the Arsenal manager, says his team were better than Paris Saint-Germain over two legs of their Champions League semi-final. They weren’t

Arteta is not generally a delusional man. But as the disappointment of this busted season swirls he is in danger of sounding like one

When it has come to the really important moments of this season, Arsenal have come up short

Defeat hurts and it does strange things to the mind. So we will give Arteta the benefit of the doubt on some of this stuff.

Equally, when it has come to the really important moments of this season, Arsenal have come up short and – regardless of the injury list that has hampered his squad – that should worry him. They should be better. They need to be better. And quickly.

A look at Liverpool’s season sees statement wins and important results scattered all over it. No team are perfect but, on the whole, when Arne Slot’s team have needed to bounce, they have bounced.

Arsenal have not bounced. There has been too much splat. They have not felt that rush of momentum and adrenaline that is supposed to take a champion team from one big victory to another.

The London club have probably recorded four such wins over the course of the season. A Champions League first-phase win over PSG back in October, a 5-1 thumping of Manchester City in the Premier League in February and their home and away victories over Real Madrid in recent weeks.

Impressive performances when taken in isolation but isolated results lead a team nowhere. It’s the body of work that matters and just as Arsenal failed to take the feel- good of their Real Madrid successes into the home leg of the semi-final against PSG, so they allowed themselves to flatline domestically after that win against City.

The Emirates was alive that day in late winter. ‘Stay humble’ was their message to Erling Haaland after that win. Young Myles Lewis-Skelly even mimicked the great City striker’s celebration after scoring one of the goals.

Which was all very nice until they followed it with a Carabao Cup semi-final defeat at Newcastle three days later and, before long, a home reverse to West Ham that pretty much decided the title race.

Arsenal followed up a thrashing of Manchester City with a Carabao Cup semi-final defeat at Newcastle three days later

And before long, there was a home reverse to West Ham that pretty much decided the title race

Arsenal crashed out after a 3-1 aggregate defeat by PSG, losing both legs of the semi-final

That one – along with the loss to PSG at the Emirates last week – probably stands out as the season’s great mis-step.

Liverpool were wobbling at the time. Their form was uncertain and they were due to play at City the following day. A win for Arsenal would have brought the whole thing to the boil. But Arsenal didn’t win. West Ham did. You could almost feel the release of the pressure valve at Anfield. Liverpool, quite predictably, won at the Etihad and that was pretty much that.

Now you can look at all this as unhappy coincidence if you wish. Or you can look back at a season that has merely failed to take flight when the chance was there and ask why that happened.

Even a Carabao Cup win would have helped Arteta, simply because it would have stopped the ticking of a clock that now says Arsenal haven’t lifted a trophy for five years.

But Arsenal flunked that one – losing both legs of the semi-final – while the FA Cup disappeared when they couldn’t beat 10-man Manchester United at home in round three.

They had a good number of their best players on the field that day, incidentally, and still couldn’t win. Yes, Arsenal have missed their forward Kai Havertz but he played against United in that one and missed chances that his grandmother may have been fancied to score.

So regret is the overriding theme of Arsenal’s season in the way that perhaps it hasn’t been in the previous two.

Losing two title contests to a formidable City team shames nobody. Heavens, Liverpool know how that feels. But this one has been different. Those campaigns were characterised by progress – by the feeling of a second coming – in a way that this one has not.

Losing two title contests to a formidable City team shames nobody

Arsenal couldn't beat 10-man Manchester United in the FA Cup when Kai Havertz missed a hatful of chances

Even a Carabao Cup win would have helped Arteta simply because it would have stopped the ticking of a clock that now says Arsenal haven’t lifted a trophy for five years

This one feels like a stall. It feels as though pause has been pressed on an evolution. How many Arsenal players would make it into your team of the season? Declan Rice? Maybe. Anyone else? Probably not.

So now it is indeed half a decade without that trophy and the clock starts to tick on Arteta. The Spaniard remains one of our most impressive and admirable managers. I don’t question his body of work at the Emirates and his club’s direction of travel remains forward.

But the 43-year-old heads into this summer knowing that recruitment lies at the heart of next season’s prospects. Better players. More players. The right players. But also sharper brains and harder minds. A greater understanding of the ebb and flow of a football season and an instinctive feeling about when the level needs to be raised.

Arsenal remain a very good team but not a champion team. Excuses and statements full of holes do not help them with that.

Take the Trent money and move on from this saga

If Real Madrid do offer Liverpool money to release Trent Alexander Arnold from his contract so that he can play for them in the Club World Cup, then the Premier League champions should take it.

This already feels like a story that could grow ugly if it is allowed to drag on, so an early farewell may suit everybody.

If Real Madrid offer Liverpool money to release Trent Alexander Arnold from his contract so that he can play for them in the Club World Cup, the Reds should take it

Why Terry SHOULDN'T have taken infamous penalty 

Claude Makelele has waited 17 years to tell us that one of the great Champions League stories should never have been written.

The former France midfielder – once of Chelsea – claims John Terry was not due to take the penalty he fluffed in the 2008 final shootout against Manchester United in Moscow.

Knowing a successful kick would secure the trophy, Makelele says the Chelsea defender took the ball from Salomon Kalou.

‘He was trying to be the hero and I was very angry when he missed,’ says Makelele.

We await Terry’s response on this one as it’s quite a claim. But regardless, there is another way of looking at it.

Terry was the Chelsea captain and the biggest trophy in the club’s history was on the line. Maybe he just felt he should take responsibility. Maybe that’s just a leader trying to lead.

Claude Makelele claims John Terry was not due to take the penalty he fluffed in the 2008 final shootout against Manchester United in Moscow

Terry was the Chelsea captain and the biggest trophy in the club’s history was on the line. Maybe he just felt he should take responsibility

You'll need more than that, Tony 

Brighton chairman Tony Bloom hopes he can ‘disrupt’ Scottish football by making a £10m investment in Hearts.

Celtic earned more than £90m from the Champions League this season so it’s an ambitious claim.