Arsenal Youth vs Liverpool Youth - Emirates Stadium, London - Friday 22nd May 2009

Everybody knows that Arsenal have some great young players. So, it shouldn't really be a surprise to see the Arsenal Under 18s team in the FA Youth Cup Final. What is probably more surprising is why they haven't been there over the previous years - this being their first final since the early part of the decade. In any case, it was a good opportunity to see some promising kids play, all for £3 admission too. As expected, there were plenty of fans there who were a fair bit younger than the players, and a good few local kids there too - always a good thing to see.

I had the unmissable opportunity to watch this game from the Diamond Club - the very exclusive area in executive box level, which is home to under 100 members, who each pay £25,000 a year for the privilege of watching their games from there. It has a Raymond Blanc restaurant (at a price!), and a "free" bar - not free of course for those paying £25k a season, but free for us for the evening. It isn't often that Arsenal buy you a beer, so I took as much advantage as possible.

About half an hour before kick off, Lukasz Fabianski walked into the bar where we were waiting for the game. A few started to bombard him with autograph requests, and I just stood and gawped, not really too interested in his autograph. A few minutes later, though, Cesc Fabregas arrived, and for him, I was interested. After fighting through a few kids, I managed to get a photo with the man himself - something decent to remember from an otherwise disappointing season!

So to the match. The view was obviously fantastic - the best view I've ever had at a football match. We looked down onto the Directors Box, with Arsene Wenger, Pat Rice, Liam Brady and a host of others there. The view for me was like watching on a huge widescreen TV, it was a TV perfect angle, right on the half way line. Very much like watching on telly, except you had the added bonus of being there. The roof of the executive tier comes surprisingly far down, so it feels quite cosy in there, almost like you are in a room with one open wall, if that makes any sense.

The game itself was full of good news - Arsenal won 4-1, and looked by far the better team throughout. Knowing him from the first team, I was keeping an eye on Jack Wilshere, and he was fantastic - setting up 2 goals, and drilling in a penalty himself. Watching the kids is always a bit weird in that they play exactly like the first team - it seems that the layout and style of play is exactly the same in every Arsenal team, just the players are different. So, it was like any Arsenal game where the team are on song, the play is fluent, and the result is the right one. A pleasure to watch, and we should be able to finish the job next week in the second leg.

The Guardian, to their immense credit, sent a reporter to cover the game (although, being based in Kings Cross, and living in Highbury they probably didn't have to travel too far!), so we can at least read a vaguely professional match report - not one that is more interested in the view from Diamond Club. As for Diamond Club, you could really get used to watching games from there - but the £25k a year required to do so may be a little hard to find!