Gilberto Silva said Arsenal need to ask themselves “what they need to do” in order to win the Premier League having come close in recent years.
The 2024/25 season was the third time in as many years Arsenal have finished runners-up as their league drought stretches to 21 years.
Silva, himself a title winner in the 2003/04 Invicbiles squad, told the squad and Mikel Arteta that a difficult question must be answered if they hope to go one better.
“If we see overall, we can consider it a good season,” he exclusively told Football365. “In spite of the fact there is no trophy.
“Because if we always evaluate a good season when a team wins the trophy, all the rest of the 19 teams did a bad job.
“They finished second in the Premier League. Of course, especially in the Premier League, all of us were expecting a better result, considering the last two years were chasing the title and this time again, but in the middle of the way, something happened.
“They didn’t get the results. A lot of injured players, which cost them so many points. And I think the question for them now is what do they need to do in order to get there?
“They are so close, but there is a question they need to find the answer, to ask themselves.
“‘What else do we need to do more and much better that the others did and we didn’t?’”
Silva himself moved to Arsenal in 2002 having been born on the other side of the world and reflected on his first days at the club.
“It was something new to discover. In the early days of my life playing football, I never imagined to be having the opportunity to cross the ocean to play for a club like Arsenal,” Silva, now 48, said.
“It was a great opportunity for me to improve my life, to improve the life of my family, improve myself as a human being and a professional.
“But having in my mind, as long as I stay in the club, I’ll do my best and in the moment I leave, to make sure, I have done a great job and leave the place better than when I arrived.”
Silva was speaking to Football365 from the Emirates Stadium for the OMO Varzenal Cup which saw teams from Brazil compete on the Arsenal pitch. Asked why Arsenal was so popular in Brazil, Silva highlighted the team’s former players.
“Arsenal has more than 20 years of connection with Brazil,” Silva said. “Silvinho was the first Brazilian player who wore the jersey and then I did myself, and then some others.
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“And in the time that they started to show the Premier League in Brazil as well and I guess that because of the Brazilian players playing for the club, it opens the bridge for the Brazilian football fans to start to say ‘Okay, Arsenal is going to be my team. There’s some Brazilians there.’
“I’m glad to be part of the history because this connection between Brazil and England is something fantastic. Arsenal really respected their own roots, from where the club starts, but also working in the community as well, supporting people, they do a great job here.
“But then in Brazil, football is about supporting those guys who play for the love of the game and for a better day when they are playing football.”
Várzea is the Brazilian version of grassroots football and Silva said it was so important for the people of the country, just as it is in England.
“Football, várzea, as we call it, and grassroots in England, it’s about how football starts, how it began for all of us, how it begins for this club.
“People know people who love football, they start to make some friends to play the game. This was how my life started. I was in amateur football before I became professional, playing these types of games in my town, in the region close to my town, up until the moment, I had an opportunity to be in a club with infrastructure.
“Once you are there, you never imagine that this chance will come to you, until the moment you are there and face all the challenges.”
For more updates on the campaign, including the launch of KondZilla’s documentary follow @omobrasil