The rain had done little to quiet the Emirates.
If anything, the sound seemed to carry further through the wet afternoon, with every chant and roar travelling around the stadium before crashing back toward the pitch.
Then the noise grew louder right as the teams began to come out.
The match officials emerged first, followed by Arsenal and Wigan, the players walking onto the pitch with the short warm-up already behind them.
Tens of thousands of Arsenal supporters rose from their seats as a familiar gooner chant began rolling around the stadium with voices joining together until it became almost impossible to distinguish one section from another.
Through it all, the players kept moving as above them, the stands seemed to stretch endlessly.
More than seventy thousand supporters had packed themselves into the Emirates, and almost every one of them had something to look forward to.
For the next two hours, everything else could wait.
