Standing on the Clock End at the Emirates Stadium last Saturday evening I turned to my Dad, put my head on his shoulder and told him that I was exhausted. We had suffered through an agonising 96 minutes of tension, nerves and twitchy clock-watching. It was never easy, it never is with Arsenal, but when Max Dowman raced 70-yards to make it 2-0 to Arsenal against a stubborn Everton, we finally had catharsis.
The 16-year-old, who had slalomed past two defenders and torn up the open grass to become the youngest ever Premier League goal scorer, raced away into the corner on the far side of the ground to us and received the acclaim of the adoring fans.
As the crowd continued to bounce, fling itself across rows and swell with a sense that this could be the moment the Gunners tighten their iron grip on the Premier League title, I could only slump back down into my seat and look to the grey panels and string of lights along the stadium’s roof.
I have been fortunate enough to live opposite the Emirates Stadium in each of the previous four seasons. These years have brought a lot of joy, but little substance. From my bedroom window, I have had to endure lengthy taunts of visiting fans strolling down my road mocking another second-place finish or a late winner at the Gunners’ expense.
I have seen N5 at its best. Be it the BlackStock pub on a Saturday night after a crucial win, Clissold Park in the sun before a late season game or strolling down Holloway Road with its pavements teeming with red and white. Yet I am still to taste north London after clinching major silverware.
It only seems like yesterday that I went with my Dad to see Arsenal beat Aston Villa 2-1 on 31 August 2022, the day before I moved into my current house. We stopped briefly outside my new home, not knowing that I would still be there almost four years later.
Arsenal made it five wins from their opening five games that night, launching their first major assault on the title in years. No one had thought Mikel Arteta’s side, who had collapsed to finish fifth the previous campaign, would be the runaway title favourites at Christmas.
By 4 March, Arsenal were top in a tussle with Pep Guardiola’s imperious Manchester City. Every game brought immense pressure to take maximum points, any slip up would be ravaged by the monsters on the inexperienced Arsenal’s tail.
Slipping 2-0 down to Bournemouth was not supposed to happen. There had not been any serious expectations before the season to lift the title, but falling behind to the seemingly relegation-bound Cherries was inexcusable. A fightback ensued and, with the scores level, Reiss Nelson rifled home in the 97th minute to win the game.
My Dad and I were at the ground, but at opposite ends. The old ticketing system had meant I could only snag two seats: behind the goal in the North Bank for me and his towards the Clock End.
In that moment, when Nelson brought the ball under his control and fired at goal, I could have been anywhere. The world stopped for a moment before the ripple of the net sent myself and 60,000 people into bedlam – united as one, a chaotic melee of limbs, scarves and tumbling bodies, believing that Arsenal would win the league.
Of course, they did not. Burnt by that season’s unravelling, and those that have followed, I have been hesitant to truly be swept up in undying belief that all will come together. I have found it difficult to set my expectations so high, only to have them crushed so bitterly. My support is unwavering, but to consider glory could be in touching distance feels inconceivable.
This sense is no greater than in the Champions League, which not even my Dad or any Arsenal fan has seen the club lift. So, when Real Madrid sauntered into the capital with the glitziest forward line in football, I had felt sick with nerves. I just could not find the optimism to match those of friends I’d met pre-match who were insistent that Arsenal would swipe the Spanish giants aside.
Despite it taking just a few minutes to get to the ground, I took my spot in the lower Clock End an hour before kick-off. My parents were in Copenhagen for an anniversary trip planned months in advance of the draw, much to my Dad’s cursing.
His ticket had been sold on the exchange. The lucky recipient was a fan, sporting a half-and-half scarf, who frustratingly spent much of the game on his phone sending photos and videos on WhatsApp, rather than watching arguably the greatest result in Arsenal’s European history.
No one can know what possessed Declan Rice on 8 April 2025. Before the game, the Englishman had never scored a free-kick in his career. By full-time, he had scored two of the best the Emirates Stadium had ever seen.
The first, a curled effort that ripped around the wall, put the Gunners 1-0 up and helped settle my jangly nerves. When Rice stepped up to take the second, there was almost a sense that the ball was destined to beat Thibaut Courtois, and it did.
Mikel Merino made it 3-0 and I have never felt anything like it. The delirium had made me feel like I was floating. I checked my phone. “Dad goes crazy. Thank God the negronis and wine have anaesthetised his knee,” read a text from my Mum.
We were reunited again for the semi-final against Paris Saint-Germain and were crushed by a hapless display. A week later, the Parisians dumped the Gunners out of the tournament and would go on to thump Inter Milan in the final.
This season has been crying out for a moment of pure exultation. The Emirates has been a tad flat and opposition defences have proved tougher to break down, as was again the case with Everton. 30 games into the Premier League season and holding a seven-point gap over Manchester City should have felt more thrilling, but every game had felt like a crawl to just get over the line. Arsenal needed something to reignite a less than febrile crowd.
Fans around us had spent much of the game slamming players for poor passes or groaning about refereeing decisions. The previous years’ excitement of being in a title race had been transformed into, at times, a mild sense of entitlement, that anything other than Arsenal blasting past mid-table Premier League opposition was not enough. It is not that simple.
Which is how, 88 minutes into the game against Everton, another dull, costly draw seemed to be etching closer and closer into reality. The thought of City dismantling West Ham and moving within five points of Arsenal was too much to bear.
After a slow build up, met with anger by the crowd, the ball came to Dowman on the right. His cross evaded the herculean leap from Jordan Pickford and bounced kindly off Piero Hincapie to trickle across the face of the goal and provide Viktor Gyökeres with an easy tap in.
The nerves were not completely alleviated and an Everton corner in the 96th minute spelt trouble. I rocked on the balls of my feet, bit at the corner of my thumbnail furiously and turned to my Dad for a sense of calm – which he was not.
But when Martinelli headed clear to set the young Dowman on his way, that viciously addictive feeling came rushing back. Maybe, finally, this is the moment that means Arsenal really will do it and go on from here to win the Premier League.
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Jack McRae writes... 