Hello and welcome to our coverage of the FA Cup final between Arsenal and Aston Villa at Wembley. It’s been a dismal few days for football, what with Sepp Blatter winning re-election yesterday, so let’s treat this as a prestigious palette-cleanser and a reminder that football isn’t all about shady back-room deals and FBI raids – it’s the glory game, where legends are made and history rewritten.

Arsene Wenger also spoke about Wilshere this week, responding to those comments regarding wanting to be wanted: "I made Jack Wilshere start at 17 years of age. That means that you cannot show a bigger desire for wanting a player and we have always extended his contract and we have been very patient with all his injuries. At some stage I think he must feel wanted. We always stood by him through every difficult moment. Does that mean we want him to stay here for a longer period? Yes, as we would like to benefit from his talent now. He has not played regularly since November, Jack. That is five or six months.”

We’ll get on to Villa shortly, and discuss some of their key protagonists, but this seems like a good moment to touch on another Arsenal player whose long-term future has been the subject of speculation: Jack Wilshere. Manchester City are said to be interested in the England midfielder, who said an interview recently that he “wants to be wanted”. No doubt a response to his slow return to the starting XI following injury, but he was excellent in his first start in six months against Sunderland and then scored the goal of the season (according to enthusiastic Arsenal fans watching MOTD with Tweetdeck open, anyway) against West Brom. Like Ramsey, he has been displaced from a central role and it will be fascinating to see if he starts today. He probably won’t, purely because Coquelin and Cazorla have the middle locked down, with Ramsey likely to start on the right.

I'm not sure that really counts as trolling, more a heartfelt message to two friends as they play in a big cup final. Still, the original definition of trolling has become so transformed as to be virtually indistinguishable these days.

Arsene Wenger spoke about Walcott's future this week, with his contract only having a season left to run: "I want Walcott to play through the middle and I want both of them (Walcott and Wilshere) to stay here. I think he is good enough. Anyway he can play on the flank, but if you ask me where do I see him in the future, it is through the middle. If you ask him, he will tell you as well through the middle. He has electric pace, and he has top, top quality in the timing of his runs. If you have that quality if you analyse that, it is the quality of his receptions, the space where he gets the ball basically, that is above average compared to many players."

Walcott is a funny one. You watch him play against West Brom on the final day and he plays through the centre, scoring a brilliant hat-trick, and you have to admire his work. But then too often he will squander clear-cut chances if playing as a striker. If he's out wide then he doesn't get in the team - Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and the displaced Aaron Ramsey and Jack Wlishere are superior options - so it has to be up front and I don't think he's up to it, ultimately. Having said that, he probably should start today ahead of Olivier Giroud, who has been off the pace as the season finishes, as Walcott is a confidence player and should be in a good frame of mind after that hat-trick.

Theo Walcott's just been on the radio, talking about his position in the team: "It's been well documented that I want to play up front, but in this team you just play anywhere, I think."

The list of FA Cup winners is as follows: 11 - Arsenal, Manchester United; 8 - Tottenham Hotspur; 7 - Liverpool, Chelsea, Aston Villa. It might seem strange to those born after 1995 or so, but Villa are traditionally a big club. Trust me. Years of drift under Randy Lerner have denuded the reputation of a club which once aspired to much greater feats. Some time ago now, mind you. But it's good to see them back in a cup final.

Sherwood, hoping to win Villa's first FA Cup since 1957, has had some very kind words for Wenger in the build-up to this match. Sherwood clearly admires the Frenchman. He's had 44 games as a manager while the final is Wenger's 1,065th in charge of Arsenal. Discussing the discontent which sporadically erupts amongst Arsenal fans, Sherwood (who is not, repeat not, an Arsenal fan), said: "You have got to be careful what you wish for as a fan. For me he's done a tremendous job. If you line up the chairman and every director in a football club they all want a Wenger. Maybe Chelsea and Man City might be an exception because they've got gazillions of pounds to keep throwing at it. If you want a sustainable business and someone to run it through, I think Arsene Wenger is a great model of that."

As fate would have it, the man in the opposite dugout is an Arsenal fan. Well, he would deny it, but there is a body of evidence which suggests otherwise. Tim Sherwood is the man plotting Wenger’s downfall. Indeed, it probably wouldn’t be too unfair to describe him as the anti-Wenger – all cockiness, passion and bluster, and no small amount of intelligence. Clearly he’s a better manager than many give him credit for, with that dismissive ‘Tactics Tim’ nickname an unjustly sarcastic tag for a man who performed well at Spurs – WIN PERCENTAGE!! – and revitalised Villa after taking over from the perma-glum Paul Lambert.

As that video suggests, Arsenal were in the FA Cup final last year, having to come back from two goals down to beat Hull City 3-2, with Ramsey netting the winner in extra-time. It is widely suspected that if Arsenal had lost that match, Wenger would have quit, with the weight of public opinion forcing him out. But he survived, and can write another chapter in his already engorged Arsenal history.