Arsenal’s last game, at the Emirates on December 15, 2019, before Mikel Arteta joined the team as manager, was against Manchester City and it was strange because the Spaniard was in the City dugout that day. Arteta was Pep Guardiola’s assistant on Sunday and Arsenal manager five days later.
Arsenal lost that game 3-0. In fact, they were trailing by three points after 40 minutes and, when he met the media at his unveiling as Arsenal manager on 20 December, Arteta spoke about many of the problems.
“I saw what was happening and I felt sad,” Arteta said of his view from the opposite dugout.
‘It wasn’t just the acting, it was the atmosphere and the energy that I perceived. That worried me a little bit.
‘I understand that the fans are used to success and fighting for things and at the moment it is difficult for them to accept the situation.
Keeping Mikel Arteta could help Arsenal in their quest to overtake Manchester City
Arteta was concerned about the atmosphere at the Emirates when Arsenal lost to Manchester City at the end of 2019
‘Then let me help you.’
Almost five years on, Arteta has done his part. Arsenal is a football club that has been reborn and reinvented, on and off the pitch. And on the day it was revealed that the Spaniard had signed a new contract designed to keep him in north London for another three years, it seems fitting to say that Arsenal now have City in their sights both in the short and long term.
Arteta and his young, smart and athletic team have been behind City for some time. Two seasons ago, Guardiola and his star team beat Arsenal in the Premier League by five points. Last year it was just two, with Arsenal winning one and drawing one in the games between the rivals.
So Arsenal are already there. Two points are nothing. An unexpected goal, a bad decision, an injury at a bad time… Any of those things can have that effect.
The important thing about Arteta’s decision to stay is that Arsenal are now perfectly positioned to take advantage for a longer period of the upheaval and change that may be about to visit City 200 miles to the north.
The hearing on the 115-count charge against City over alleged financial irregularities in the Premier League begins in London on Monday and no one knows how or where it will end. If the verdict goes against them, there has been talk of possible relegation as punishment. For now, that is speculation.
Of real and more tangible importance is that Guardiola’s own future remains uncertain. The Catalan great has a contract that expires next June. So far, the messages about the possibilities of him renewing it have been contradictory.
Guardiola could certainly leave the Etihad after what would be his ninth season. And if he does, there is a very real possibility – understood and accepted by those at the reigning champions’ house – that sporting director Txiki Begiristain and chief executive Ferran Soriano will go with him.
Arteta and his young, smart and athletic team have been on City’s shoulders for some time now.
Arteta’s Arsenal somewhat mirror City in terms of stability, vision and strategy.
There are concerns that Pep Guardiola could leave City after this season along with director of football Txiki Begiristain (right) and chief executive Ferran Soriano (left).
Begiristain and Soriano arrived at City from Barcelona four years before Guardiola, but with the idea that their great friend would eventually follow them. As a trio, they have built one of the great dynasties of English football. Almost everything that happens at City bears the Catalan stamp.
And while no-one expects City to crumble if all three men leave, such a day would inevitably present challenges and the champions are well aware of that. As it stands, with Arteta now committed and entrenched, Arsenal are the best-placed club to take advantage of any change in circumstances for their modern rival.
Arsenal somewhat mirror City in their current form. It was what Arteta always wanted when he returned to the club he once played for. Arteta wanted something of City’s stability, vision and strategy. He also wanted something of their footballing culture. Working closely, particularly with sporting director Edu, Arteta has brought all that and more to the doors of this great London sporting institution.
City did not have to show the same patience as Arsenal as Arteta’s reboot played out. Guardiola found everything in the Premier League – playing styles, fixtures, refereeing – a real puzzle in his first season in 2016/17 and his side finished third in the Premier League and went out in the first knockout phase of the Champions League. City were ready for Guardiola, though. Begiristain and Soriano had already laid the groundwork. Guardiola’s side won the title by 19 points the following season and have not looked back.
Arsenal have had to wait much longer and are not yet there. Arteta’s only trophy remains the FA Cup he lifted at the end of that first half-season in charge. At some point that will have to change. However, the bravery Arsenal showed as Arteta struggled to turn that hulking red-and-white tank around serves as an example to others whose steadfastness so often betrays them in this treacherous sporting environment.
Casting our minds back to that day at the Emirates against City in December 2019, there is only one Arsenal player in the starting XI who can expect to play against Tottenham in Sunday’s north London derby, Brazilian winger Gabriel Martinelli. City’s squad, meanwhile, had six players who could still expect to be in Guardiola’s team tomorrow against Brentford if they are fit and available.
That illustrates the magnitude of Arteta’s revolution. That is the essence of it. Mesut Ozil and Pierre Emerick Aubameyang played for Arsenal that day and the club simply cannot tolerate such wastrels now that Arteta’s time has passed its second phase and is in its third.
Arsenal are waiting patiently to take advantage of any potential opportunity to overtake City.
We were expecting Guardiola and Jose Mourinho to have the next big rivalry in the Premier League
Arsenal and Arteta have managed to move up the pack and are worrying Guardiola
Arsenal now have a young squad, which continues to improve thanks to intelligent work in the transfer market. Once again, there have been shades of City in their work. You have to sign when you are winning and when you are strong. You have to do it before the need is clear and obvious to everyone else. You have to act quickly, quietly and intelligently.
Edu makes those deals, but it is Arteta’s imprint that weighs heavily on the composition of his squad. Had it not been for the Arsenal manager and his intelligence, the last two title races would have vanished. Liverpool finished nine points behind in third place last season, while Manchester United were 14 points behind the year before.
The challenge ahead for the Gunners is clear: win the first one and take the next step. Arsenal are on the way, though, and it would be a surprise if there were too many problems that they hadn’t already foreseen.
When Guardiola arrived in Manchester eight and a half years ago, we expected the great rivalry to be between him and José Mourinho, who had arrived at United that same summer.
We were wrong. That place was soon taken by Jurgen Klopp at Liverpool. Now, the Premier League world has turned around again and it is Arteta who has moved up the pack to worry his old friend.
We don’t know how long it will last, because in Manchester a door may soon open and Arsenal are standing firm and patient at the threshold. So this not only looks like a great day for Arsenal, but also for the Premier League.