The full text is as follows↓
All preparations are ready. On the training ground where he raises the hounds known as "win", the team with the highest value for active players in the world is ready to go for a new journey. The sports director he had personally selected was still operating the transfer deal, and Emirates Stadium made a detailed revamp for him again. After personally selecting the team song, his latest order requires the removal of the player's access ceiling because that layer of shading would weaken the sound of the stadium. It is rumored that he even set the temperature of the ice therapy box himself: Arsenal is now the kingdom of Arteta.
When the Premier League rekindled the war, there is no more exciting story than the young coach who is chasing the Premier League crown with a torch-eyed look and gritting his teeth. Arteta has built the club into its own territory, but is still waiting for the moment of crowning. Just as the viewpoint of the public opinion field continues to ferment, the 2025-26 season has become the critical point of "if you fail, you will succeed". This season will determine whether the Gunners coach becomes a legend or fails.
Will this 43-year-old coach finally hold the Giants to the top in his sixth full season in his coaching like Manchester United's Sir Ferguson? Or may he repeat the mistakes of Benitez during Liverpool's period. Although he made outstanding achievements, he always missed the Premier League championship and left the field after six years of hard work?
The preseason has shown the fanatical atmosphere of fans' return. The defeat of Villarreal caused anxiety, but his outstanding performance against Athletic Bilbao three days later made fans excited to declare that Zubimendi "promising to be the best midfielder in Spain's history". This statement was enough to make Xavi, Iniesta, Busquets and Rodri raise their eyebrows together. Arteta must control this emotional fluctuation and break through the brutal league competition year by year. The "Premier Big6" opponents alone spent 1 billion pounds to sign up this summer. Of course, the Gunners themselves also invested heavily because they firmly believed in the coach's judgment on the development trajectory.
If Arteta leads Arsenal to the Premier League this season, it will be the longest case in the Premier League era except for Sir Ferguson (Manchester United).
For Arteta, victory stems from the accumulation of details. His Arsenal is trekking inch by inch to the promised land. He always emphasized the basic elements: after being eliminated by Paris last season in the Champions League, he insisted that "100% is the best team in the game" and brought out the expected goal value to support it; on Friday he also declared that "we have surpassed any opponent in the past three seasons" (although Manchester City actually has more). Regarding his three consecutive years of runner-up, he believes that "according to these data, we should have won the Premier League twice", but in the eyes of those who pursue Vince Lombardi's philosophy of "either the championship or the defeat", this "sight of the world" is worth discussing.
The total points of Premier League teams in the past three seasons↓
He attributed the referee's misfortune and injury waves in the 2024-25 season, but the overall misjudgment and injury data of the league do not support this statement, and "player attendance" is the core indicator for smart clubs to evaluate coaching levels. My point is: The Gunners and their coach need a leapfrog breakthrough rather than a minor repair, but they do have this potential, especially after the exquisite signings this summer. Just look back at Emery's lineup before the class was dismissed in December 2019 (back line: Niles, Papastasopoulos, Chambers, Korashinac; midfielder: Torrera, Gondozi) to measure how far they have come.
This summer's transfer continues Arteta's philosophy of "marginal gain", but it can be regarded as the most convincing presentation of his concept. It uses upgraded players to replace Thomas: Zubimendi replaces Thomas, Maduaike replaces Sterling, Kepa replaces Neto, Noelga replaces Jorginho, and Moscra takes over Fu'an Jianyang.
The only exception is Yorkress, the Swedish center who joined from Sporting Lisbon for £63.5 million, ended the Gunners' lack of world-class No. 9 since Aubameyang left the team. His technical characteristics focus on penetrating the final defense line, completing a large number of touches and endings in the penalty area, and being a real center. This signing deeply reveals Arteta's change in thinking.
Arteta asked the sports director to operate the big deal, and finally chose Berta, which is closely related to the Yorke team among the candidates provided by the club. When Isaac was judged unavailable, the alternative was for Arsenal scouts to track Sesco for four years, but the potential stock at the age of 22 needs to be crafted, while the 27-year-old Jicres scored 109 goals for the club and national team since the 2023-24 season, which is considered ready-to-fight. Although there are many failures in the Portuguese Super League scorers' listings in the Premier League, the preseason showed Yorke's core competitiveness without fear of the environment: aggressive running, smell in front of the goal, and strong physique. It is hard to remember when the last time the Arsenal striker could score his violent header.
Although there are doubts about his ability to reverse the foot and the accuracy of touching the ball, the Gunners do not need him to be Haaland. In this team that advocates collective offense, the No. 9 player may be enough to 15-20 goals in a single season. Arteta is increasingly inclined to introduce finished players, marking that the club has bid farewell to the reconstruction period and entered the sprint stage. The early work focused on eliminating players who did not meet the requirements (recalling the defense line in 2019), and now it is turning to improving the maturity of the lineup. This summer, the average age of new players is 26.8 years old, which happens to be close to the golden age of winning the championship recognized by CIES Football Observatory (26.5 years old). In fact, since Arteta's first summer window (2020), Arsenal's net investment in players aged 23-30 is the world's largest. Behind the 91 players entering and leaving the roster is an increasingly cold decision. July's termination of the contract during the recovery of Fu'an Kenyo's knee injury shocked the Japanese football world.
Since Arteta took over the transfer window for the first time in the summer of 2020, compared with net expenditure of players of mature age groups (23-30 years old) of each team↓
In a sense, we are witnessing Arsenal replicating Manchester United's successful model in the Ferguson era (not subsequent): supporting a coach for many years, allowing him to gradually improve, paying attention to cultural construction and not only the theory of achievement. Arteta always shows a clear blueprint to the top leaders. His temperament, extreme self-discipline and firm belief, made his business partners comment: "Mickel? He is a tough guy, extremely confident and extremely smart." It is this trait that convinced the conservative Kroenke family to bet, and he is the type worth betting on.
This young coach who left Manchester City's assistant coach with zero coaching experience was able to negotiate hard that year to gain two years of coaching guarantee for himself, which is worth learning from by young coaches. Amazon's "One-to-beat" documentary presents his early mobilization: holding a light bulb to explain the concept of energy, nightclubs compare girls, and even forcibly linking the Russian-Ukrainian war with the necessity of defeating the Wolves. TV critics mocked him as "like a helpless substitute teacher", but the locker room needs some drama. Years of interviews show that players value the authenticity of the coach most (quirks are actually bonus points), driving force and decisiveness. This coach who will introduce a treatment dog "win" specifically for Kearney's base and declare to the media without any concealment that "it perfectly represents our spirit" is obviously well aware of this.
Of course, players also need tactical masters. Bilbao coach Valverde and other opponents praised Arsenal's tactical qualities. Former Manchester United assistant coach Van der Gacher explained to me the Gunners' unique system: the midfield man-sea tactics when controlling the ball are the most difficult to deal with in the Premier League, and after losing the ball, they instantly switched to the defensive mode. So why are there always a slight difference? In the past two seasons, Arteta, who believes in "marginal gain", has tried to control risks and win with subtle advantages. Setting ball tactics and Saka's inspiration... Some Gunners fans complained about too many "horsehoof-shaped passes" (the ball mechanically transferred between the two wings and waited for gaps). But the era of conservative winning has long ended. The last three Premier League champions are the strongest firepower, and the best defenses are all behind.
As Ronaldinho's roommate during Paris Saint-Germain, Arteta might need to learn from his old friends' casualness. Although he insists on his own opinions, he also tolerate objections (co-workers can testify). Those slightly clichéd motivational methods just reflect his spirit of exploration. Against Bilbao, the Gunners tried more diversified attacks: looking for Jicres directly in the backcourt, transferring Saka from a long pass, making early crosses, and infiltrating through. To be fair, Subimedi does seem to be a wonderful addition. This intelligent all-around midfielder is by no means a mere drag-back role, and the chemistry Rice has with him (more retracement and holding the ball) is worth paying attention to. "We need to continue to develop weapons that threaten the last line of defense from all regions." Arteta's statement acknowledged that the need for tactical diversity is intriguing.
Arsenal is a model of operation. On the premise of avoiding violating PSR rules, the world's richest sports consortium Kroenke Entertainment Group (valued at £16.1 billion) continues to invest. The club takes into account long-term planning. Important operations this summer include locking in the long-term contract between 18-year-old supernova Lewis Skeley and Envanelli, while the 15-year-old attacker Dorman (smaller than Arteta's eldest son and only advanced to the 11th grade of middle school in September) is more inspiring the future. The emergence of No. 10 star Doman and Arteta's belief that Envanelli is also the most suitable for the middle, is why the club retains interest in Eze but gives priority to strengthening other positions. James Ellis (a sports strategy expert at Loughborough and Warwick University) will coordinate the full-chain system from the youth training echelon to the development of young front-line players.
may be "the moment is eternal" for Arteta, but the future is still long for the club. It is hard to imagine that if there are no important trophys to be recorded next season, he can continue to draw the blueprint. After all, Benitez still has the Champions League side at Liverpool, while Espanyol currently has the same number of trophys in England (including the community shield) as Glasner (Crystal Palace) and Rogers (Leicester City). People often forget that he is still a young man, and only Mourinho (Chelsea in 2004) has won the Premier League as a younger person. At this point, his work is extraordinary, but the next step is whether he can make a leap, not only move forward, will ultimately define his legend.