The 2025/26 Season Review (2): Players

 Arsenal spent £247.8 million last summer on a total of 8 new signings. 

Kepa Arrizabalaga was our first signing. He arrived on 1 July 2025 on a 3-year contract after Arsenal met the £5 million release clause in his Chelsea contract. It looked to be a bargain for a player with his experience and track record. As a back-up keeper, he fared alright, but Arteta might think twice about playing him in goal, if we reach another domestic cup final next season.

On 6 July 2025, Zubimendi followed his compatriot Kepa on a long-term contract in a deal reportedly worth around £55.8 million. This signing was always expected since he turned down Liverpool's offer in the previous summer. He was once touted as the Signing of the Season. However, by his admission, the vigour of the Premier League eventually took its toll as physical and mental fatigue set in in the latter part of the season. He lost his starting place to resurging MLS in the latter stage of the season. Still, winning the title in his debut season while appearing in each of 38 Premier League games is no mean feat. Hopefully, a new signing in midfield will ease his workload next season.

Next, Christian Norgaard joined us on 10 July on a 2-year deal for a reported fee of £10 million. Arsenal attempted to extend Partey's stay, but the plan fell through and we turned our interest to then-Brentford captain. It looked an astute signing, and he didn't put a foot wrong all season. Unfortunately, Arteta didn't seem to trust him very much, with the result that his playing time was limited. Arsenal may go to the market to find a Partey replacement once again.

Noni Madueke arrived on 18 July on a 5-year contract amid strong protest from a corner of the Arsenal fanbase just because he was a Chelsea player. A reported transfer fee of £48.5 million seemed a bit steep for a back-up player, but squad depth was this transfer window's mantra. As it turned out, his signing was key to our title challenge due to Saka's injury lay-off, which was more frequent and longer this season. Madueke proved to be a valuable attacking option, who provided unpredictability and directness, although he struggled to produce end-products at times.

On 24 July, Cristhian Mosquera joined us on a long-term contract for an initial fee believed to be £13 million. Despite his tender age, he was already regularly playing for Valencia. Following Tomiyasu's departure, we desperately needed a versatile defender. Despite his mistake in the Champions League final while playing at right-back, he has a massive potential to be the next Saliba.

Amid calls for an out-and-out striker since last season, Viktor Gyökeres signed a 5-year deal on 26 July for a fee of £55 million. He was meant to be given  time to acclimatise himself to the new environment, but Arteta had no choice but to throw him into what was described as the toughest opening fixtures after Havertz's injury during our first game of the season against Man U. The Swedish striker had virtually no preseason preparations as he refused to join the Sporting training camp in an effort to push through his move to us. He lacks technical quality, when compared with his team-mates, but he ended the campaign as our top goal-scorer (14 in the Premier League and 20 across all competitions).

On 23 August 2025, Eze completed a move to his boyhood club Arsenal for an initial fee of £60 million plus a potential £7.5 million in add-ons, on a 4-year deal. He became an instant fan favourite after making a last-minute U-turn from his move to Spurs, and became a legend after scoring a hat-trick in his first north London derby and a brace at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. Despite those heroics, he remains an enigma to us. There is more to come from him once his role is established within this group of players.

Finally, Hincapié joined us on 1 September on a season-long loan with an option to buy reportedly set at £45 million. In an effort to ensure the compliance of UEFA financial fair play rules, Andrea Berta engineered an ingenious deal with Bayer Leverkusen. He seamlessly filled Big Gabi's shoes when the Brazilian was injured, while as a left-back he offered a more defensively secure option and played a more traditional overlapping full-back role, going forward, as opposed to an inverted and more attacking left-back in Calafiori, who pops up everywhere, including in centre-forward positions. The Ecuadorian's loan deal is set to be made permanent anytime now

These new signings, some of whom appeared to be too expensive for a back-up player, proved to be imperative to sustaining our title push over the season. The aim of the summer transfer window was to build a squad that do not suffer a significant drop in quality when first-choice players were injured. 

Indeed, we seemed to have suffered more than a fair share of injuries this season, in particular on the offensive side. Saka and Odegaard, combined with White at right-back, were our best attacking unit in the past seasons, with telepathic understanding of each other's movements, but these three hardly played together due to their respective injury woes. 

While new signings were trying to find their feet and build chemistry with their new team-mates, our established forward players struggled to re-discover last season's form. Known as a clinical finisher in the previous seasons, Trossard seemed to have lost his goal-scoring touch. The season-defining goal against West Ham in May was his first in 2026, which spoke volumes for his lack of form. Maybe his private life was affecting his performances, which finally improved during the run-in. Martinelli's output also dipped this season, except in the Champions League (6), with just one goal in the Premier League to his name.

We missed Merino during the run-in. When Arteta fielded him in midfield alongside Zubimendi and Rice in a 1-0 defeat at Anfield at the end of August, the manager was criticised for a "negative" approach and "defensive" setup against the reigning champions. However, Merino's eye for through balls in the final third is as good as any traditional No. 10. On top of that, he proved last season that he can be deployed as a centre forward. Merino was a big loss in the title race, although he managed to come back just in time for the last game of the Premier League.

With no stand-out attacking players this season, our defensive players won accolades. Raya won the Premier League Golden Glove for the third season in a row, keeping the most clean sheets (9) in the Champions League, too. Some of his outstanding saves proved decisive in the title race. Challenging him for the Arsenal Player of the Season, Rice drove us to our first Premier League title in 22 years with his leadership and tireless work. Raya, Rice and Big Gabi are currently up for the PFA Players' Player of the Year award. These three Gunners were also named in UEFA's official Champions League Team of the Season. As well as the trio, Timber and Saliba also made the Premier League Team of the Season. Rice was magnificent in both campaigns this season, but his direct goal contributions seemingly suffered. The England international showed his attacking potential last season as a box-to-box player, while he was mostly deployed as either one of double pivots or a deeper role protecting the two centre-backs (as well as a right-back on two occasions) this season. Hopefully, we will be able to see more of the attacking side of Rice's game next season.

Having tied down Big Gabi, MLS, Saliba, and Saka to long-term contracts in the past 12 months, combined with an amazing talent in Max Dowman, who had a sensational breakthrough season, our dominance in the Premier League could continue over years. Our key players are in their prime years, as well. However, we cannot  stand still in our defence of the Premier League title next season. Arteta and the hierarchy are already planning reinforcement.

The 2025/26 Season Review (1): Matches

It's fair to say that the 2025/26 season was a successful season as we won our first Premier League title in 22 years. Rival team players and their fans mocked our penalty shootout loss to PSG in the Champions League final, but any club would wish to be in our position as the champions of the world's toughest league to win. 

The victory parade, which took place on Sunday, 31 May, saw more than 1 million people (according to the Islington Council) turn up to celebrate the historic win with the players and coaching staff. The streets of north London were lined with joyous faces after a 22-year wait. It was a day of a pure joy and love. The scale of the crowd highlighted how big our club is, while the event showed deep connections between the fans, the team, and the club, including the owner.

Like other seasons, this one also had its ups and downs. Staying at the top of the table for 248 days and amassing 26 wins and 85 points in total in the Premier League, as well as reaching the Champions League final without losing a single game on the way, finishing the Carabao Cup campaign as runners-up, and reaching the FA Cup quarter-finals, there were more highs than lows this season. However, looking back, defeats seemed to have defined this season more than wins. Declan Rice's iconic phrase "It's not done" after a devastating 2-1 loss at the Etihad epitomised our title challenge this season. The defeat came after a damaging 2-1 loss to Bournemouth at the Emirates a week earlier. Given Man City's history, in which they pulled off long winning streaks before winning the titles, our title hopes appeared on the brink, but Rice had other ideas. Also, Arteta called for a reset and vowed to win all of the remaining games. After the setback, we went on a 5-match winning run before the end of the Premier League season, while Man City dropped points at Everton's new home and at Bournemouth. In the end, we won the league with a game to spare, finishing the campaign 7 points clear of second-placed Man City.

That said, it wasn't pretty how we won the league. As supporters, we had to go through a hard watch for a number of games this season. Those 1-0 wins in the run-in were particularly difficult to watch. Our style of play often came under criticism. However, we had been playing an easy-on-the eye football for a number of years previously, especially in Wenger's post-Highbury era. Even under Arteta, when we scored the club record number of goals a couple of seasons ago, we still fell short of winning the league. It was an entertaining football for neutrals, but chaos never wins you a championship.

After ending as runners-up for three years in a row, Arteta turned to a pragmatic approach. He built a platform on our strengths, defensive solidity. With the ball, control was the keyword this season. Slow build-up play often frustrated us, possessional dominance and the control of the game were an integral part of our game. Mikel also weaponised set-piece routines. Set-pieces were an effective tool for finding a breakthrough against low blocks of defence, and our set-piece routines evolved throughout the season under the guidance of Nicolas Jover. Short corners were the latest experimentation. Those routines frustrated us at the beginning, but eventually proved successful as Eze's stunner from a short corner delivered precious 3 points in a crucial 1-0 win over Newcastle at the Emirates. 

Perhaps Arteta would have liked us to play our trade-mark free-flowing football. However, for several reasons (largely due to injuries to our key attacking players), we could not deliver that. We even struggled from time to time to string a couple of passes together, but we still found a way to win in a majority of matches. They used to say "winning ugly is a trait of champions". Apparently, it doesn't apply to the Arsenal. Arteta and his side had to put up with unfair criticism (or "noise") all season. Ultimately, our resilience and determination were the difference from the previous seasons that enabled us to get over the line. At times, this team seemed little improvement over the last season's in terms of performances, but they finally ended our long wait for the Premier League title.

Pragmatism allowed Arteta to finally get over the line. After getting the monkey off his back, the manager may turn the focus from results to performances next season. After the heartache of the Champions League final penalty shootout loss, this group of the players are now even hungrier for more glories.

We will look at individual players' performances next time.