Yesterday afternoon/evening, there was a flurry of articles that were released interviewing Josh Kroenke, as the co-chairman of Arsenal, to discuss the journey that the club has been on since he and his father became majority stakeholders at The Arsenal. I myself read the [Telegraph one by Sam Dean](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2026/05/28/josh-kroenke-interview-arsenal-champions-arteta-stadium/) (my dad has an account so I get access for free).
The article talks about the most recent past, the trophy lift, where he was when Bournemouth got the draw against City to win us the title, etc. All good stuff. But it also delves into the events of 2019, when a small group of Arsenal fans, content creators, and people who have connections with the club got together to form the movement “We Care, Do You?”
I was in the room, surrounded by those Arsenal fans on Holloway Road, back then, when the collective discussion was about what we could do to unite as Arsenal fans to make the club stand up and listen. The _modus operandi_ of that group was not to blindly hurl abuse at the Kroenkes. It wasn’t an attempt to get them to change their business model and blindly/wildly throw money at the problem of where the club was heading. It was to reconnect with us as fans, to rebuild the relationship, to get us moving in the right direction, to establish lines of communication that would get Arsenal going in the right direction. The people who sat in the room that day all wanted the same thing – success for The Arsenal – it’s just that we didn’t believe that KSE wanted the same thing. They didn’t communicate to us.
So to see these interviews that have come out over the last 24 hours, to look at what Josh has said in the press, to hear him – through the media – say that they took a step back, they listened, they learned, and they admitted that mistakes were made and decided to try to rebuild that relationship from that moment, well, that makes me so happy.
I’ve titled today’s blog the ‘KSE Apology Tour’, but that’s not quite right. I am not sorry for what I was a small part of (others in that room and part of the group invested far more time than I did to raise the awareness – I have to say), I am not sorry that I lent my admittedly small voice to the movement, I am not going to apologise for wanting the best for Arsenal Football Club. But I will admit that I have reframed my perspective of KSE.
If you go back over my archive around five years, you’ll know that I repeatedly admitted to a distrust of the Kroenkes. Stan had made comments over the years like “you don’t get into sports ownership to win things” and the like, we’d had him turn up at AGMs and sit there silently and appear to view us fans with almost disdain – or that was at least my reading of it. We were the ‘Legacy Fans’ who were just a bit of a nuisance. That’s how I felt about him. But Josh has been a big part of changing that perspective. The recognition that he has made that connecting with the fans, listening to the fans, and being open to suggestion, is huge I think. The access he has granted to people like my old mate Akhil from the Arsenal Supporters Trust is huge, because whilst they don’t pertain to speak for every Arsenal fan, they are a representative group for a collection of fans. They work on people like me (I am an AST member) to give us a voice and to make sure that it gets through to the club and KSE. And now we feel like we are being listened.
Josh talks in his many interviews that were released yesterday, that the _We Care Do You_ movement impacted them directly, that he is just human, and humans can change, which is a good sign for me to see and read. And in the same vein, I’m reframing my view on KSE. They have shown themselves to certainly be capable owners, to listen to fans’ concerns, to not be as impulsive as we can be (they could have sacked Arteta pretty soon into his tenure, but stayed the course, and we need to ultimately thank them for that), and the result has culminated in the success we are all revelling in right now.
They won’t get everything right in future. They are humans. But knowing that they are willing to do everything in their power to make Arsenal as successful as possible is all I ever needed. It’s all anyone who signed their name to the _We Care Do You?_ movement ever wanted. I’ve been on the WhatsApp group and chatting with the people who were part of it over the last week. The sentiment is clear – we’re all happy that this has ended in the most positive way possible – it’s all anyone ever wanted.
Victory Through Harmony.