Arsenal review of the season: Finally ending 22-year wait – and leaving one hurdle to overcome

Right, there are going to be two sets of honourable mentions. One for the squad as a whole, and then one for Eberechi Eze.

Martin Zubimendi’s volley against Nottingham Forest was the first breathtaking goal of the season, while Noni Madueke’s thunderbolt away to Club Brugge was similarly stunning. Viktor Gyokeres’ first goal against Spurs in February also deserves a mention as that felt like the first time he had scored a type of goal that seemed typical for him with Sporting CP.

Where do we start with Eze? Of the five goals he scored against Spurs, four of them are worthy of a shout, with his left-footed strike at the Emirates and acrobatic opener at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium particularly pleasing from a technical standpoint. His finish against Newcastle United from the short corner was important as well as spectacular, but the flick and volley against Bayer Leverkusen takes the prize.

Arsenal needed something special at that moment, given the form of the Leverkusen goalkeeper. And Eze produced what many had hoped to see when he signed from Crystal Palace.

Hopefully this does not seem like a strange selection given how early it came, but Arsenal’s 2-1 win over Newcastle United on September 28 stands out as an instrumental moment of this season.

The two 4-1 wins over Spurs were more entertaining, and the recent 3-0 thrashing of Fulham felt liberating, but that Newcastle win felt like the first real marker being laid down by the champions. They were the better side for most of that game, and being 1-0 down due to a Gabriel mistake felt nonsensical given the run of play.

Arteta used his bench as expertly, with Mikel Merino, Martin Odegaard and Myles Lewis-Skelly all having key involvements in turning it around at a ground where Arsenal had previously struggled.

Gabriel being the one to score the winner put the cherry on top.

This will be spoken about a little more in the next section, but the number of mistakes leading to goals from Arsenal after the New Year was staggering. Not knowing that they would go on to lift the league, these hiccups occurring even in matches they won were a contributing factor to the nervousness around the team.

These errors crept in almost on a game-by-game basis from late January and throughout February which, considering the control Arsenal had in previous seasons, was surprising.

With snow swirling around the freezing-cold Molineux, it seemed the full-time whistle would never blow. Arsenal had already allowed Wolves to gather momentum. The lack of communication between goalkeeper and centre-back, which led to Wolves’ equaliser, was without doubt the lowest point of Arsenal’s season.

Forgive me if I choose a personal one… on one Friday in February, I asked Mikel Arteta in a pre-match press conference about the rise in Premier League goals from outside the box. Zubimendi then scored another against Sunderland the next day, and the Arsenal manager joked: “That’s after our conversation (in the pre-match press conference).”

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Funniest moment of the season

This has to be Piero Hincapie’s shorts and boxers getting caught in the Emirates turf at home against Burnley. That the cartoonish nature of that moment was exceptionally funny.

Genuine bursts of laughter came from the press box when Sky Sports’ slow-motion replays came on the monitors, and seeing the reactions of Hincapie’s team-mates humanised them all in a way that doesn’t often happen. Unsurprisingly, Ben White was the main culprit with his disbelieving embrace with Hincapie caught at full-time before his cheeky request atop the Arsenal parade bus this weekend.

Like with Rogers last year, though, Arsenal’s clashes with Bournemouth could have provided a glimpse of what is soon to come. Eli Junior Kroupi’s goal from outside the box at the Vitality Stadium in January was breathtaking, and even more impressive considering he started the passage on the right wing. His opener at the Emirates in April showed his knack for being in the right place at the right time, while he was also involved in the build-up for their winner in the second half. In both matches, he brought a spark that few players have done against Arsenal recently.

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The issue that will dominate this summer is…

How Arsenal will evolve to form a new Premier League dynasty, and take that final step to win the Champions League.

That issue will no doubt surround their transfer business, which makes Arteta’s post-Champions League final words encouraging, as he said: “I will take a few days with my family and then we will all start the process to review what we’ve done.

“We’ll start to make some very important decisions. We want to reach another level. We’re going to have to show that ambition because they are more than capable of doing it, but it’s going to demand us to be very, very ambitious, very fast and very smart.”

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This time next year we’ll all be saying…

That just like when Declan Rice said “It’s not done” after the 2-1 loss at Manchester City in April, he was right in saying this during the Premier League trophy parade: “Next year we’re coming back for more. Lock in or get locked out.”