Never managed anything before. Not a reserve side. Not an under-21s team. Not even a six-month spell at some League Two club to learn on the job. His management experience? Three years working under Pep Guardiola at City. Arsenal gave him the job in December 2019. They were eighth. Three points off relegation. Squad full of players on massive wages who didn’t fit any kind of system. Supporters completely out of patience with the whole mess.
The case for Arteta? Guardiola rated him. Seriously, that was the whole pitch.
Six years later they’re champions.
WHERE IT STARTED
Things were grimmer than eighth place let on. Mesut Ozil pulling in £350,000 a week, offering almost nothing, unmovable because of that contract. Aubameyang had the armband but was clearly going to become a problem. A group of players who’d been let drift under Emery and, before that, under Wenger staying on too long. Ljungberg took one game as caretaker. Then Arteta walked in.
First game: 1-1 draw at Bournemouth, Boxing Day 2019. Chelsea won the second 1-0. Got his first win New Year’s Day against United – 2-0 at the Emirates, Sokratis and Pepe scoring. Finished that season eighth. But the league wasn’t really the story. The FA Cup was.
THE FA CUP THAT CHANGED EVERYTHING
Beat City in the semi. Had thirty percent possession. Only managed four shots all game. Won 2-0. Final against Chelsea – three shots on target, 2-1 win. Aubameyang scoring all four goals between the two matches. First Arsenal manager to win major silverware in his opening season since George Graham in 1986-87.
That trophy mattered beyond just winning something. There’d been genuine questions about whether this whole thing made any sense. Beating City and Chelsea in an FA Cup, doing it mostly without the ball and still making it work – that bought Arteta the time and trust to actually rebuild.
THE REBUILD
Ozil went first. Left in January 2021 despite everyone thinking that £350,000 weekly made him impossible to shift. Aubameyang lost the captaincy in December 2021 for disciplinary reasons. Barcelona took him a month later. Lacazette out. Willian out. The whole culture that had enabled it all, taken apart piece by piece.
What came in: Odegaard permanently from Real Madrid. Ben White and Aaron Ramsdale the same summer. Gabriel Magalhaes. Thomas Partey. Saliba, who’d been shipped out on loan three times and returned as a different player entirely – best centre-back in the Premier League by season’s end. Then Declan Rice for £105 million. Havertz. Timber. Zubimendi last summer. Gyokeres in January.
Every transfer window moving forward. Every signing fitting a clear profile. Building a team that got physically stronger and technically sharper at the same time – not easy to pull off, and not something Arsenal had managed in years.
He also brought Nicolas Jover from City as set piece coach. That corner routine that delivered 17 league goals this season, the one nobody could solve all year, started there.
Overall record: 61.4 percent wins – highest of any permanent Arsenal manager in club history, better than Wenger’s career mark. By his 300th match he’d won 177 – more than any other Arsenal boss at the same point. Thirteen clear of Wenger’s tally.
WHEN IT WENT WRONG
2022/23. Arsenal led from October. Played some of the best stuff the Emirates had seen in twenty years. Saka and Odegaard and Martinelli. Went to the Etihad and beat City 1-0 with everyone watching. Then came April and May. City won eight of their last ten. Arsenal won five of their last ten. City finished champions by five points. Second.
2023/24. Led again. Six points clear in March. Second again. This one went to the final day. Liverpool had already won and Arsenal could only watch.
Those two seasons handed everyone with doubts something concrete to point at. Two collapses in two years with the title there for the taking. The question going into this season: could he actually finish it when everything was on the line?
His response: didn’t change the system, didn’t panic, signed Gyokeres in January and Zubimendi the summer before, and went again.
THIS SEASON
Champions League final against PSG. Carabao Cup final where City beat them 2-0. FA Cup exit. An injury list that simultaneously included Saka, Havertz, Timber, Merino and Eze. Arsenal playing the second half against Newcastle with ten fit outfield players in the entire squad.
Still finished with 82 points. Still five clear. Still sat watching Bournemouth hold City 1-1 on a Tuesday night in May knowing the job was done.
This season’s numbers: 17 corner goals, a Premier League record. Eight single-goal wins. Saliba and Gabriel with 13 clean sheets in games they started together. 82 points – most in Arsenal Premier League history. More than any Wenger team ever managed. More than either near-miss. Best Arsenal league campaign since 2004, finishing with the title it deserved.
WHERE IT ENDS
December 2019. Arsenal eighth. No European football. Manager with zero experience. Nobody watching felt certain it would work. Some were convinced it wouldn’t.
May 2026. England’s champions for the first time in 22 years. Highest win rate of any permanent manager in the club’s history. Squad rebuilt from scratch. Two painful near-misses that didn’t break the project. One title that proved it all.
Arteta’s 44. Just signed a new contract. Title defense starts in August. The question’s changed from whether he’s good enough to win it to how many more he can add.
That’s what six years and one Tuesday night in Bournemouth gets you.
For full coverage of Arsenal’s title-winning season and every Premier League story from 2025/26, visit our Premier League news and match coverage, and if you want to watch Arsenal’s trophy lift at Crystal Palace on Sunday, here is our guide to the best ways to stream Premier League games live.