Are Arsenal Their Own Worst Enemy? 

We all witnessed the borderline historical win that Manchester United had over Arsenal at the Emirates yesterday. That win ended Arsenal’s unbeaten run at home this 25/26 season, and sent most Arsenal fans into an understandable meltdown. Statistically speaking, this should have been a guaranteed win for Arsenal. Perhaps not an easy one, but guaranteed regardless. They are top of the table, after all. However, we all know that football will humble you…and yesterday was no different. Arsenal were, after the first 30 minutes in which they initially took the lead, arguably outplayed by United. And the sad part is that, over the past 3 years, this is the stage that Arsenal tend to do exactly this…fail when it matters most.

Now, before you assume that this is another Arsenal-hating media outlet (because most media is definitely against Arsenal, from what we have seen), we have a majority Arsenal supporter-base on our team at present…including me. So, don’t worry, this will actually be an objective article.

From the game, it’s safe to say that Manchester United’s win was deserved. A Zubimendi mistake capitalised on by Mbeumo and then two crackers (Dorgu who is in incredible form and Cunha as a supersub) lead them to a 2 – 3 win over the Gunners. And yes, there were two questionable calls from the referee in charge involving handballs, but we all know that you cannot depend on Refs or VAR to make correct calls anymore. The only thing any team can ever do is BE THE BETTER TEAM ON THE DAY. And that’s what United did. On the day, they were better, more composed.

This leads to our analysis of Arsenal’s squad and the question, “are Arsenal their own worst enemy?” No one with even a little bit of football knowledge would state that United are a better or fuller squad than Arsenal this season. Arsenal have several world class players, some even called the best in the world in their positions, and yet they lost to United. It was a convincing win from the Manchester side, against a very complete Arsenal. So what is Arsenal’s problem? It’s not the squad depth or talent (we have all seen how incredible the Arsenal bench is). It’s not the manager (Arteta put everything into this game and even subbed players on earlier than usual when he saw the direction the game was headed). And it’s not the staff. What it is, is the mentality of the boys.

The belief of the squad is lacking. They seem to be afraid of greatness. It’s like they can’t quite seem to grasp the idea of actually being champions…because they’ve never done it before. And that anxiety can weigh on even the best of teams. Now, whether this loss to Manchester United was due to the superstitiously infamous black kit (that historically has led to some major wins against Arsenal in United’s favour, should you believe in that nonsense) or if the boys are just fatigued from playing at such a high level consistently since the beginning of the season in 4 competitions, Arsenal have managed to drop more points, and hence let Manchester City and Aston Villa draw ever so closer to them at the top of the table. It wouldn’t be fair to Arsenal not to mention that United are only in one competition (the English Premier League) and nothing else so they were way more rested than the Gunners. It definitely would have played a big part in the energy of the players on both sides. But a loss is a loss and fans are not very forgiving when it comes to their expectations at this high level.

And now the term “bottlers” has, inevitably, started being tossed around by rivals and other Arsenal haters. Arsenal fans can only hope that the boys somehow push past this mental block this time around and prove everyone wrong. Only they are standing in their way of greatness because their mentality is not strong enough. And unfortunately, the mind is a powerful thing. They have a set-piece coach. They have a throw-in coach. Do they need a mindset coach?