After Rayan Cherki’s cross and the quadruple slipped through Kepa’s fingers, it would have been easy to blame Mikel Arteta, not to mention the hapless keeper himself.

In a cup final on English football’s biggest stage, it is normally a good idea to field your best players. Both managers went with their second-string keepers and Arteta’s decision backfired. Badly. There can be no disguising Arteta’s culpability for this defeat. Nor Kepa’s, of course.

But Arsenal did not lose because City’s breakthrough came courtesy of a bad goalkeeping mistake. Arsenal lost because they were unadventurous and uninspiring. It was as if they played down to the way they have been unfairly stereotyped.

Take, as an example, a moment in the very early stages of the second half that, feasibly, could not be worse than the first one. Kepa stood in possession of the football on his penalty spot and City players decided not to close him down. And Kepa just stood there, doing nothing. For a long time. It was a cameo of nothingness that symbolised Arsenal’s approach to this match.

Bar one brief spell in the first half and a spot of late attacking, they struggled to put together any attacking sequences. And if they are not doing that, their stalling tactics look particularly unattractive.

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The amount of time taken at set-pieces in English club football is verging on the preposterous. Arsenal are not the only culprits but are amongst the biggest ones. But if it pays to make a game disjointed against any team, it is still City. Because even this less magnificent version of City can still be irresistible when it gets going.

And that is why responsibility for the loss should not lie solely with the Arteta-Kepa combination. Pep Guardiola’s side were more inventive, more incisive and might even have been slightly more industrious. In the likes of Cherki and Jeremy Doku, they had risk-takers - and Arsenal had none.

Time after time, Doku endeavoured to beat his man. It was hard to recall an Arsenal player taking on and beating an opponent. Even after sending on extra attackers, Arsenal never troubled City. It has to be stressed that in the second half, City were excellent. They were a throwback to some of Pep’s best teams.

There is certainly no shame in being beaten by a very talented, expensively-assembled team. And for the penalty-area awareness and strength he demonstrated for both his goals, Nico O’Reilly was an inspirational match winner.

But it was the nature of Arsenal’s overall performance that could worry supporters. They are, of course, still in a great position in the Premier League and even defeat at the Etihad in mid-April would not be overly calamitous.

But the look on Declan Rice’s face at the end of what became a one-sided game said it all. Rice can look tired at the best of times, to be fair, but on this occasion, he looked shattered. Physically and mentally.

He is the sort of player who can go again, who can respond to setbacks, who can lead from the front when reacting to adversity. But he looks like he needs a rest. This was not just the end of fanciful quadruple hopes, this was a reminder that - for all their great work so far this season - the hard stuff is just beginning.

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