THE EDITOR: The banter era is over, Arsenal is back and all guns blazing. After its victories away to Tottenham Hotspur and at home to Manchester United, I am convinced that Arsenal will win the Premier League after 18 years. Thanks a lot Pep Guardiola, Zinchenko and Jesus were bargain signings. Mikel Arteta, big up your whole self, you are the next footballing genius.
Arsene Wenger predicted Arteta as a future Arsenal manager. What a blessing. Wenger has done it again. Arsenal has always been criticised for being mentally weak, slow in the transfer market and overall a team of sons-in-law.
Despite a history of fluid, attacking football, it has always been a defensively naive unit and absent from big fixtures against the Premier League top six and Champions League bigwigs, which has kept it in and around the big-club status but far from the elite level.
Thanks to Unai Emery, Arsenal has discovered talent like Saka and Martinelli and Emery deserves some credit for the team’s rebuild and identifying major flaws in the running of Arsenal.
After much clamouring to the owners, Kroenke Sports and Entertainment, they’ve finally pumped investment into new backroom staff, players, infrastructure and an upgrade on the “self-sustaining” model they depended on to pay off for the Emirates stadium during Wenger’s reign.
Technical director Edu Gaspar, apart from being an invincible and having Arsenal DNA, he has absolutely led the charge from an administrative point of view by backing Arteta in his pursuit of the right players, promoting youth, clearing out deadwood players, rebuilding the connection of the club to the fans and being strategic in the transfer market.
Arsenal has surely learned from the past, such that no player will go into the last year of their contract undecided. Discipline and passion when playing for Arsenal is a must, competition for places, an economically feasible wage bill and a swagger and ruthlessness to win no matter the opposition or competition.
Arsenal must win football games without the referees, VAR, the Football Association, those salty parrot pundits on Sky Sports, those clowns on talkSPORT and the flip-flop ESPN panel minus Shaka Hislop. The hate and jealousy of Arsenal can’t get worse than the penalty given when Wayne Rooney dived in 2004 at Old Trafford to end its unbeaten streak.
Arteta is my manager, I love his antics on the touchline. We are top of the league.
KENDELL KARAN
Chaguanas