Arsenal legend Ian Wright on the Gunners moment that 'broke' him – ‘Like ripping your heart out’

Arsenal and England legend Ian Wright
(Image credit: Getty Images)

Ian Wright says he “never cried so much” as when Arsenal suffered a gut-wrenching defeat in the last minute of extra-time against Real Zaragoza to lose the Cup Winners’ Cup final.

The Gunners were bidding to win the European trophy for a second consecutive season in 1994/95, having beaten Parma in the showpiece game a year earlier.

John Hartson struck to cancel out Juan Esnaider’s goal in the second half and force extra-time. But with one minute to go until a penalty shoot-out, a dipping long-range wonder-strike from Nayim won it for the Spaniards.

“With us in the final the second year – and Nayim from the half-way line – it was devastating,” Wright said on the Stick to Football podcast.

“I’d started thinking, ‘right, I’m going to take a penalty, I’m going to probably get the fifth one’, [then I] looked over and it was the last second.

“It was like ripping your heart out and letting you see it before you fall over.

TV pundit and former Arsenal player, Ian Wright during the FA Cup Third Round match between Nottingham Forest and Arsenal at the City Ground, Nottingham on Sunday 9th January 2022.

Wright described the pain of losing a final (Image credit: Jon Hobley/MI News/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

“When he hit it, I looked at the goalie and you could see he was backtracking. He’s like, ‘Jesus!’, and then when you saw it go in – I’ve never cried so much.

“Opportunism is what I thought to myself. You’re not expecting it. I’m thinking about the penalties and then ‘bam!’ he does that.

“What happened was I was this side, and all their fans were down [the other side], and you know when you see other fans erupt – my heart was broken, trampled on.”

Wright would recover from the disappointment to win a superb Premier League and FA Cup double with the Gunners in 1997/98, his final season at Arsenal.

He left north London as the club’s all-time top scorer with 185 goals, until Thierry Henry later took the record from him by reaching 228.

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Alasdair Mackenzie is a freelance journalist based in Rome, and a FourFourTwo contributor since 2015. When not pulling on the FFT shirt, he can be found at Reuters, The Times and the i. An Italophile since growing up on a diet of Football Italia on Channel 4, he now counts himself among thousands of fans sharing a passion for Ross County and Lazio.