The Arsenal manager made a tactless error last week - and there's a very good reason why this could come back to bite him
Subscribe to Mail+ to read Ian Herbert's unmissable column every Tuesday, plus more of your favourite writers, exclusive stories and in-depth sports reporting
By IAN HERBERT
Published: 12:00 EDT, 20 May 2025 | Updated: 12:00 EDT, 20 May 2025
Mikel Arteta, something of a specialist in the art of finishing second, this year introduced more bite to his annual wistful Emirates Stadium ritual of saying things would be different next season.
A year ago, he conjured something rather beautiful out of finishing behind Manchester City, taking the microphone from the Emirates stadium announcer after the team had signed off in the sunshine against Everton, and telling the people: ‘You started to believe. You started to understand what we had to do. Don’t be satisfied. We want more than that.’
Arsenal’s social media team tweeted a gorgeous black and white video clip of Arsenal’s players that day, entitled ‘Keep Believing’.
But three successive second-place finishes are something no club has had to endure since themselves in 1999, 2000 and 2001 behind Manchester United each time, and on Sunday Arteta implicitly suggested that it was for others – the Arsenal board – to raise their game this summer.
His expertly freighted message was buried within a message to his players, in a TV interview. ‘Finish the season, go to the beach, enjoy a few days and make sure the ones upstairs do what they have to do,’ he told his boys.
Well, given that Arteta has already been given £600million to spend in his five-and-a-half years, he would be wise to assess the landscape 4,600 miles west, in Denver, Colorado, before making too many testy observations about how the execs might usefully spend their time.
Mikel Arteta, something of a specialist in the art of finishing second, this year introduced more bite to his annual wistful Emirates Stadium ritual of saying things would be different next year
His expertly freighted message was buried within a message to his players, in a TV interview
Arsenal are the first team to finish second three years in a row since... Arsenal, in 1999-2001
Because the extraordinary recent story of Arsenal co-owner Josh Kroenke’s firing of his Denver Nuggets basketball coach demonstrates that the most significant man on the Arsenal board is an individual of intelligence, sangfroid and limited patience.
To any who view managers through the prism of the Premier League, the coach Kroenke had at the Nuggets, Mike Malone, seemed untouchable.
A feisty, pugnacious, straight-talking New York Irishman, hugely popular with fans, who had led Denver to their first ever NBA title in 2023, behind the brilliant play of Nikola Jokic, the 6ft 11in Serbian currently considered one of the top handful of players in the world.
But on April 8, out of nowhere, Kroenke fired Malone, along with the team’s general manager Calvin Booth. It was the most sensational sacking in modern basketball history, three games out from the NBA play-offs that the Nuggets had just qualified for, and some of the responses demonstrated the size of the gamble. One source spoke of the ‘disrespect’ afforded to Malone.
Kroenke proceeded to stage a press conference with the seasoned Nuggets beat reporters to explain his decision. Viewable on YouTube, it is an extremely impressive and thorough performance, revealing, amongst other qualities, Kroenke’s intuitive feel for how sport works. NBA insiders say that the 45-year-old, who has taken up the Arsenal mantle from his father, Stan, deconstructs the typical owner’s son stereotype.
'He’s good with the coaches, good with the players, knows sport and isn't just the stereotypical rich and entitled playboy,’ says one source. Where basketball is concerned, it helps that Kroenke is an accomplished former college player at the University of Missouri.
The Denver episode also revealed Kroenke’s aversion to different branches of a team being set against another. Malone and Booth’s failing relationship contributed to the decision to sack them both.
Those firings paid a dividend. After Malone’s departure, the Nuggets - with Jokic and fellow veteran Russell Westbrook looking a lot of the time like they were doing the coaching - beat the LA Clippers 4-3 in the first round of the Western Conference play-offs.
Josh Kroenke, who has taken up the Arsenal mantle from his father, Stan, deconstructs the typical owner’s son stereotype
In Kroenke Jnr, there is a co-chairman who will acutely sense the missed title opportunity this season
Stan Kroenke (centre) accepts the NBA Finals trophy, the first in the history of the Denver Nuggets, who were led by Serbian icon Nikola Jokic (furthest right)
That took them effectively to the last eight of the NBA play-offs - where they were defeated 4-3 on Sunday night by the Oklahoma City Thunder. They pushed OKC, huge favourites to win the whole thing, further than anyone had expected.
‘The ones upstairs’ at Arsenal, as Arteta describes them, do not just include the faceless Stan Kroenke, who rarely visited Arsenal and for a long time charged the club a £3m annual consultancy fee. In Kroenke Jnr, there is a co-chairman who will acutely sense the missed title opportunity this season.
Ray Parlour may have exaggerated things when he said that Arteta could be gone by Christmas if he can’t take Arsenal on. But Graeme Souness’ assertion in the Daily Mail last weekend - that the Spaniard will be out of a job if he gets a new striker and still doesn’t deliver - seems typically shrewd.
Josh Kroenke’s promise that there would be funds this summer was the most widely reported part of his letter to fans, published in last Sunday’s match programme. But he didn’t pull his punches, either. ‘We’ve fallen short,’ he wrote.
That ‘we’ certainly includes Arteta, the manager who told us on that sun-kissed last Sunday a year ago that 100 points may be needed to win the Premier League but who, in the season when Manchester City imploded and Liverpool were far from the complete team, hasn't even mustered 75.
It's all in the name
We were walking up to a venue near Liverpool’s Pier Head on Friday night, to hear Everton legends Bob Latchford and Graeme Sharp talk, when news dropped that the club’s fabulous new Bramley-Moore Dock stadium on the banks of the Mersey is to be sponsored by local law firm Hill Dickinson.
It’s safe to say that, at a time when Emirates, Spotify and Allianz are sponsoring some of the great arenas, fans weren’t so euphoric about the idea of telling friends ‘we’re heading up to the Hill Dickinson’ next season.
The stadium already been nicknamed locally as ‘Hickory Dickory Dock'. But this affiliation is not so bad.
Everton's new stadium already been nicknamed locally as ‘Hickory Dickory Dock'. But this affiliation is not so bad
Preserving the club’s localness, enshrined so immutably at Goodison Park, is Everton’s challenge now
Preserving the club’s localness, enshrined so immutably at Goodison Park, is Everton’s challenge now. A local firm, with international offices, sits well with that, even if its name doesn’t trip off the tongue.
Spurs hit the right notes
Respect to Tottenham’s fans for approaching the Europa League final with the same enthusiasm they showed for Wembley finals in the 1980s, in the form of the song that’s been recorded for the occasion.
I’ve played To Dare is to Do a few times and the lyrics don’t seem to extend much beyond ‘We are the Hotspur’ and ‘Tottenham is our Home'.
Not exactly Ossie Ardiles ‘knees have gone all trembly’ but the voice of John Motson features, which is always a plus for me. Award-winning musicians Jimmy Napes and Paul Epworth, who’ve worked with Sam Smith, Adele, Madonna and Rihanna, are behind it and proceeds go to the Noah’s Ark children’s hospice, which Spurs support.
A ray of light after a hard, hard season.
Here's to you, Shrimpers
My heart on Wednesday night will be with the club whose fans it has become a privilege to get to know - and who have been peerless in fighting on through adversity
Southend United, who travel to Forest Green for a National League play off semi-final, were run into the ground by the egregious, now-departed owner Ron Martin but have prevailed
My heart on Wednesday night will be with the club whose fans it has become a privilege to get to know - and who have been peerless in fighting on through adversity.
Southend United, who travel to Forest Green for a National League play off semi-final, were run into the ground by the egregious, now-departed owner Ron Martin but have prevailed.
I remember their fans when they played at Wrexham a few years back, singing ‘Southend Away!’ for virtually the entirety of the game.
Those fans have been their oxygen and lifeline. Liam Ager, Brenda Smith, Matt Slater and too many more to mention here, I salute you.