Declan Rice admits he’s bitterly disappointed that Arsenal will end the season without silverware but insists Mikel Arteta’s young squad won’t be defined by another campaign of near misses.
The Gunners can seal a third consecutive second-place finish with victory over Newcastle on Sunday — no small achievement given the Premier League’s competitiveness — but with the club’s trophy drought now stretching into a fifth year, the manager is facing renewed scrutiny over his inability to get his side over the line when it really matters.
Arsenal were dumped out of the FA Cup by a 10-man Manchester United in the third round and were comfortably beaten by Newcastle in the semi-finals of the League Cup, leaving Europe as the club’s main focus. An injury-hit squad battled to the Champions League semi-finals for the first time since 2009, but didn’t have enough in the tank to overcome PSG, who ran out 3-1 winners on aggregate.
If the European run felt like a step forward, the Premier League campaign offered a more sobering reality. Despite reigning champions Manchester City faltering mid-season, Arsenal couldn’t keep pace with Liverpool, who pulled clear after Christmas to win the title with plenty to spare.
“It’s going to be three seasons in a row we’ve come close to winning the Premier League. It’s disappointing, it’s really, really tough to take, but you have to be able to take it in and be able to move on,” Rice told [Sky Sports](https://youtu.be/jHgDS8cBybw).
“It’s hard to see other teams lift trophies when you’ve been in and around it and competing, and obviously that’s the dream – to win the Premier League.
“But like I said after our game in PSG, sometimes you have to suffer these small losses in life in order to win.
“Every top player who’s won a trophy has lost along the way and they’ve never stopped believing or dreaming.”
Despite his frustration, Rice remains optimistic – not least because of the profile of Arteta’s squad, which this season has been bolstered by the emergence of Myles Lewis-Skelly and Ethan Nwaneri.
“I’m 26, half of our players in our team are so, so young. This doesn’t define us now, we’ve got a whole career ahead of us to win stuff,” he said.
“We’re going to keep pushing, keep setting out for more, and this is what this club deserves.
“We’ve been really, really close, but until we actually get our hands on a trophy again and start to win big things, I think then people will start to say Arsenal are back.
“There’s no point just being in and around it and not winning. I think we’re really close. We can sense it. Again, this year, it’s really, really disappointing, but we’re not going to let our heads drop. We’re going to keep trying to deliver for the fans and for ourselves.
He added: “It hurts. It’s sickening. I really, really care. It’s a sport I love. It’s a sport that I want to succeed in.
“Winning something with Arsenal would be absolutely incredible and I’ve still got four or five years left on my contract here to do that. So the time hasn’t happened at the minute, but I fully believe in my time here that we will.
“It’s tough to take. Don’t get me wrong. It is really tough when you lose at anything in any sport. If you have that winning mentality, it’s hard to digest.
“But also, you have to hold your hands up when other teams have been better than you and also deserve to win and Liverpool have this year. So I’m not one of them that will make excuses. Fair play to them. They fully deserve it.”
One of the criticisms often levelled at Arsenal is an apparent emotional volatility — a tendency to be swept up in highs and lows. It’s a vague, unquantifiable dig, and Rice isn’t having it. Instead, he points to lapses in ruthlessness.
“I think we’re an emotionally really strong team.
“I think we’ve just been through patches this season where in the Premier League, we’ve dropped way too many points from winning positions, took our foot off the gas in one or two of the last games and let other teams back into it.
“It’s where we need to have that killer instinct, and kill the game off, and don’t be naive, and don’t start to do things that we don’t train, and don’t start to take loads and thousands of touches and do silly things on a football pitch that can get the opposition back into the game.
“Too many times this season that’s happened, whereas last season it didn’t. But look, football’s a learning curve. We’re here to learn.”
He also highlighted the impact of injuries, with key players missing at various stages — Martin Ødegaard, Bukayo Saka, Kai Havertz, Ben White, Gabriel Jesus, Takehiro Tomiyasu and Gabriel Magalhães all sidelined for lengthy spells.
“It’s not an excuse, if you take your best four or five players out of any team in the world and still try to compete, be in the semi-final of the Champions League, be second in the Premier League, not a lot of teams would be able to do it, losing your best five players.
“We’ve really had to put that to the side and go out there as a group, whoever’s been fit, and try and deliver the best we can. We have really, really maximised ourselves in terms of the players we’ve had available.
“I think just learning – the main thing is availability, needing everyone fit, needing everyone available, needing your strongest squad, a squad of 20 to compete in every competition.
“That’s how Man City, Liverpool have been able to compete, because they’ve had their best players available, they’ve had amazing players in every position. They’re able to push each other to make it competitive.
“Next season, going, we need to make sure that we’re all way more available as a group and that we can have our strongest 11 out there to compete at all times.”
Ironically, [Rice picked up a hamstring strain](https://arseblog.news/2025/05/report-rice-struggling-with-hamstring-strain/) in training just 24 hours after conducting this interview, and is now a doubt for Sunday’s clash with Newcastle, having already missed the 2-2 draw at Anfield.
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The full interview is worth a watch — click below.