As countless thousands of Gooners packed the pubs across Islington, and a lucky few made their way south to Selhurst Park, the new Premier League Champions prepared to be congratulated by their Crystal Palace guard of honour.
Many of the regular protagonists didn’t start the game as Mikel Arteta chose to protect the most tired and those who still needed every available minute of time to continue their recovery from injury before next weekend’s Champions League final in Budapest.
It’s impossible to write about a title win or to talk about the Champions League final without remembering the wonderful fella who gave birth to this bar. It was his dearest wish in football to see the Arsenal lift “Big Ears” in his lifetime. Sadly, it was not to be but, if there is an afterlife, Dave Faber will be right there in the front row next Saturday evening. Hopefully this time …..
For this one The Arsenal lined up as –
Kepa; Zubimendi, Mosquera, Hinkapie, Calafiori; Norgaard, MLS; Madueke, Dowman, Martinelli; Jesus
Palace also took the opportunity to rest as many as possible as they are safe from relegation issues and have their own European Conference League final on Wednesday. Safe to say we were not expecting a blood and thunder conclusion to the league season.
In fact the match started at a faster pace than I had anticipated and Palace were aggressive enough to foul Max Dowman the first three times he touched the ball. This is a concern for the young man who clearly already worries opposition defences, such is his reputation at 16 years of age. We actually had several early chances to take the lead but none of Jesus, Martinelli, Dowman or even Norgaard managed to beat the keeper.
The travelling Gooners were in fine voice – “We are unbearable“ they sang as we hit the post on 20 minutes and Jesus headed 3 yards wide of the post from his starting position of, well, 3 yds wide of the post. Madueke, a real curate’s egg of a player, continued to find all sorts of ways to kick the ball straight at opposing defenders’ legs having looked a good bet to go past them.
And then, on 41 minutes a quick fire, vertical passing move saw the new Champions take the lead. Mosquera played forwards to Dowman whose clever flick fed Martinelli. He passed forwards again into the path of Gabriel Jesus who finally buried the most difficult of his four chances to that point.
Half Time: C. Palace 0 – 1 Arsenal
At the start of the second half Gabriel and Havertz replaced Calafiori and Norgaard, hopefully to give them time to maintain their ‘rhythm’ rather than due to any injury concerns. Five minutes in, ‘good’ Madueke scored with a fine first time strike from 15 yards.
C. Palace 0 – 2 Arsenal
More good news on the hour as Mikel Merino took the place of Max Dowman. The Spaniard has been a huge miss over the last four months. He would have provided opportunities to rest extremely tired midfielders, and would almost certainly have added to his impressive haul of goals from both last season and this. If the instructions were to conserve energy for next weekend, nobody had told Gabriel Martinelli who put in a couple of rapid, driving runs on the left hand side before crossing for Kai Havertz who unfortunately didn’t have his best shooting boots on.
Eberechi Eze came on to a great round of applause from both sets of fans, and Madueke left the field with what was, hopefully, only a tight hamstring rather than a strain. Viktor Gyokeres entered the fray and immediately showed us his new improved sprinting ability, if not his new improved ball skills. That is not a dig at the striker, who came on late but looked very determined to make an impact.
For Palace, Mateta scored with a strangely unchallenged header on 88 minutes. Kepa looked cross but, in truth, had done nothing to prevent it. Palace had the ball in the net again as SEVEN minutes of added time were announced. Once again Arsenal’s new insurance policy – also known as VAR – ruled out the strike as it hit a forward standing offside in front of Kepa.
“Que sera sera, Whatever will be, will be, We’re going to Hungaree” sang the travelling faithful in anticipation of next weekend. Gyokeres shot narrowly wide on 96 minutes and Eze fired against the foot of the post before Mr Halam, the referee, brought the curtain down on season 2025/26.
Full Time: C. Palace 1 – 2 Arsenal
It’s worth mentioning here that as all the Arsenal players ran onto the pitch to prepare for their presentation, Declan Rice went straight to Oliver Glasner to wish him all the best. Class.
And so …..
We finished with 85 points – 7 clear of the Oily Cheats on 78, and with a superior GD of 44 to City’s 42. City beaten, ultimately, by all the metrics that many pundits claimed would see us lose out again.
That victory is a tremendous credit to the club – owners, manager, backroom staff and players alike. It is the result of incremental improvement for a club that had completely lost its way when Mikel Arteta was appointed in 2019. Apart from improving the quality of everything he found himself surrounded by, his great aim has been to unite the club and forge a new connection with a disgruntled fan base.
The Champions League loss to PSG last season resulted in the development of a strategy to build our ability to compete with a club that boasted an amazing array of talent, not only on the pitch but also on the bench. That strategy included the recruitment of Andrea Berta to build a squad to match the very best. It’s been severely tested by a second year of serious injuries to far too many of our players. That is a discussion for another day. Ultimately that strategy has paid off and has been strongly backed by owners who were doubted by most supporters in their early years in situ.
The owners have certainly demonstrated their commitment. And we are lucky that a player who arrived 15 years ago in a transfer trolley dash, found something at the Arsenal that he fell in love with and wanted to return to. As a manager, his famous non-negotiables have led to where we are today. Congratulations all, and thank you, Mikel Arteta !
Cheers, Dave ❤️
What a thoughtful and elegant way to wrap up what has been a special league season. Hopefully, our raporteur next weekend will be able to tie a big bow around it.
And while we are honouring champions, congratulations to Potsticker for back-to-back wins in the GHF Predictathon. The final day brought some unexpected twists in the medal positions and the relegation zone, as well as the usual ups and downs in the middle of the pack, which the monks have chronicled with a one-off chart of final-day fortunes. You know where to find it…
Thank you Trev for that excellent and elegant report on the last day of a truly great league season for our side. ❤️
Excellent report, Trev, and well done tribute to the Guvna.
One more victory to immortality. Make it so.
€115y have been vanquished. A new benediction is required.
Soon, ‘Holics. Soon.
It was also worth noting the sad shake of his head that Declan gave when he heard WHam were relegated. It was a wonderful afternoon and I enjoyed every minute of the presentation and the players mugging for the camera. There are no egos on this Team and you could see how much it meant to them. The Arsenal away fans were terrific – as they have been all year. Stan has aged quite a bit. Josh was gracious and represents well. Hard to believe how far we have come since the last days of Wenger.
Given the charges against City and Pep’s abdication, chaos at the Kop & Chelsea, Man U’s malaise… no reason why we cannot repeat.
First things first, Budapest. One nil to the Arsenal. Echoes of Parma ’94. COYG
First up, thanks Trev for an excellent report and second apologies
for my churlish impatience in the last drinks 🙇
Though I didn’t think it at a drunken 02:30am Palace have every
right to celebrate some of their finest achievements
U4GN: Stan turns 79 at the end of July.
Trev,
A wonderful end to the season piece which I will return to later
I wrote this piece on Arteta for Online Gooner yesterday
https://www.onlinegooner.com/articles/view/a-love-letter-to-arsenal-boss-mikel-arteta
Great stuff, Trev and a lovely tribute to The Guv.
The Angel was rocking yesterday as we stayed the game in a great pub. Islington was full of joy and bonhomie, the sun was shining. In the words of the Foo Fighters, it’s times like these you learn to live again.
On to Budapest. We fly out in Friday.
Apologies for the typos in #8 above. Still a touch, erm, fragile this morning.
Superb season success summary, Trev. A delight to see the team lift the trophy and see the Gooner world celebrate that success like never before on planet football/soccer.
A very appropriate time too to remember Holic. I recall the day that photograph of him was taken just before lunch on the day of the Santiago Cazorla free kick FA Cup Final at Wembley. Dave was in wonderful optimistic form and he, Bath and I had fine seats in the stadium. Arsenal got off to a slow start. Tension was rising. Dave’s phone rang. Dave looked concerned and left the stadium returning quite some time later. It transpired that ‘a friend in need’ had been the caller. Important as the Arsenal and a cup final win was to him on that day, providing patient caring help and reassurance to a distressed acquaintance immediately took precedence. Dave’s heart was always absolutely in the correct place.
Thanks Trev. A most enjoyable report, finely fitting the felicitous final frolic of a fantastic season. A fitting tribute to the Guvna too. Felicitations all round.
There are great sporting achievements and then there are ones which supersede normality. May I salute Potsticker for a second successive win in the Predictathon. A terrific effort even though he deprived me of the £1 million top prize, the hose in the Bahamas and the Super Yacht which are the prizes kindly donated by Btm . Great work Potsticker .
Yesterday was a wonderful day for our club. Arteta managed our resources well and we hope next Saturday will be even more wonderful .
And good luck to Palace on Wednesday !
I did of course mean house not hose in the Bahamas although a hose might ensure good temperature control !
Congrats indeed to Potsticker, a
remarkable effort.
And to Ned and the monks too for
the first ever Cup & League double
in the long history of the HolicsRopeyLeague!
Some mightily perspicacious fellows
in this bar!
But sorry Ned, no hoes in the Bahamas
for this prize either
A superb piece in the Online Gooner by our very own TTG. Well done mate!
https://www.onlinegooner.com/articles/view/a-love-letter-to-arsenal-boss-mikel-arteta
Congratulations to Potsticker for the remarkable achievement of topping the Predictathon for the second consecutive season – well done, sir. Please have a word with MA8 and tell him how to emulate that.
Congratulations also to North Bank Ned for the Holics Ropey League and Cup double. Bad Habits were untouchable in the league, leading it for weeks and deservedly cuffed an overawed and exhausted Gunner Renaissance in the Cup Final whose final weeks saw them stumble out of the podium places but retain the top four trophy.
Well done to all who competed in both tournaments.
Huge thanks are due to all our excellent blog writers and tournament organisers and to all our readers who span the globe from Tasmania to California with multiple points in between. To the shy lurkers, please join us in the virtual hostelry and say “hello’ in the Drinks.
As Dave would have said, “You guys are the mutts!”
One last push, fellas
Thank you for the kind ones, fellas.
And congratulations to Potsticker on his second successive triumph – and to Ned although that is a mystery to me as I’ve never entered the Ropey League.
Most of all, thanks to TTG for organising and Ned for digitising (hope I’ve got that more or less correct) the Predictathon. The commentary and the brilliant array of charts every week make it so much more enjoyable. Well done, fellas ! And it apparently raised £900 for Willow. 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻
Congratulations, again, to Potsticker on his GHF Predictathon triumph. Last season, he matched the Opta Supercomputer in his predictions. This year, he trashed it, 356 points to 504. That is seriously impressive.
Bad Habits send their thanks for the good wishes on their Ropey League double. They were run closer in both competitions than the final results might suggest, but will take it :).
Thanks, too, to OM for organising the competitions and, on the Predictathon side, to Bath, Scruz and TTG for all the work they do behind the scenes.
TTG@7: A very affectionate tribute to Arteta.
I saved 20 pre-season predictions from pundits (many pick top fours, but few do 1-20s) and random YouTubers with football channels. ‘Holics stack up pretty well against them.
YouTuber James Lawrence Allcott was the pick of the bunch; he would have finished second in the Predictathon, with The Athletic’s Jon McKenzie fifth. The Opta Supercomputer would have been tenth. The Guardian’s Max Rushden would have been 15th, as would the gentlemen of the turf. The BBC’s Phil McNulty and most other YouTubers would have been in the relegation zone. Two AIs, Grok and a ChatGPT/Gemini hybrid, would have come dead last.
So, well done, you!
Brilliant, Ned ! All this extra foresight and analysis is really appreciated 🙏🏻🙏🏻
Thanks Trev a fine report of events of the day and tribute to the memory of Dave.
TTG’s tribute to Arteta in the Online Gooner also hit the spot. It’s always a bonus when reading articles in The Gooner fanzine written by our own TTG, Countryman 100 and 21st Centry Gooner.
Congrats to Potsticker for his Predictathon repeat and to Ned & the Monks for their Ropey league double success – “Doubles All Round”! Mid table mediocrity for me.
Some of us dream of mid-table mediocrity Upply.
You’re too modest, Pangloss. You are revered as the first Predictathon champion!
A lovely finale of a league matches reviews of this most memorable of a season! Thanks Trev! Let the celebrations extend into another triumph next weekend. We aren’t done yet this year.
Congratulations to Potsticker! Whatever algorithm you have invented and are running — in your own neural circuits or in some external silicon — you should be really proud of. 🙂
Thanks Ned for organizing the predicathon and making it such fun on a weekly basis. Faustus Junior sends his thanks too and hopes to end the season on top one of these years.
Some statistics from the English Premier League 2025-26
🥇 Most points (85)
🥇 Most wins (26)
🥇 Most goal difference (+44)
🥇 Most clean sheets (19)
🥇 Most clean sheets in a row (4)
🥇 Most set-piece goals (23)
🥇 Most headed goals (16)
🥇 Most MOTM awards (29)
🥇 Fewest losses (5)
🥇 Fewest goals conceded (27)
🥇 Fewest shots conceded per game (8.2)
🥇 Fewest yellow (51) and red cards (0) conceded
Can a league title be any more comprehensively emphatic (well, except for being Invincible:-)) and a season any more clearly dominant?
Dr F @26, that is some list! A hell of an achievement.
Thanks for everyone’s kind words. And thanks to Ned and TTG for organizing the Predictathon and providing the charts and analytics each week. Honestly, I can’t tell you the secret of my “success.” I can’t match the regulars here for footballing knowledge and wisdom. Maybe I am a footballing idiot savant? TTG – please send the hose by mail.
Thanks Ned @21, good to know I beat McNutty,
though losing to that clickbait halfwit at the grauniad
is annoying 😃
Not only no red cards but no penalties conceded either. Impeccable discipline from our lads.
Impeccable disciplinary record despite the fact that the PGMOL is out to get us. Not sure where Steve T. stands on that point these days, but the achievement is indeed quite remarkable. 👏👏👏👏👏
No red cards, no penalties is amazing. We got away with a couple
I expect but through a season that is a great achievement.
Just keep it up for one more CL game as Mad Jens advised Raya
the other day “play for 95 minutes and don’t get sent off” 😃
Thanks Trev
Loved this one from the Grauniads biggest flops of the season –
“The Manchester City fan with the Arsenal water bottle. Football’s era of performative idiots has its king. Deserves every bit of schadenfreude that comes his way. SN”
Champions.
UTA
Heads up Holics. AST Zoominar with 2 Arsenal executives at 20.30 tonight talking about the future and arrangements for Budapest. Then a session with Adrian Clarke looking ahead to Budapest.. Still time to register if you’re a member in good standing.
Cheers Trev, a truly enjoyable finale. A fitting one from many aspects. Jesus scores, Merino back and The Arsenal as CHAMPIONS. Oh god, yessss.
And a true fan voice about us:
https://m.youtube.com/shorts/K5pAKi29F-A
Budapest here we come!
COYG
Good to see Mikel winning the Premier League Manager of the Season award.
Despite the efforts of the managers at Bournemouth, Sunderland and Brentford,
who all certainly exceeded expectations this season I think Mikel fully deserves the bauble.
West Ham back Nuno and cut season ticket prices by 30%.
https://whufc.com/en/news/club-statement-27-may-2026
16 Arsenal players heading to World Cup
C100@38: The Athletic had this article earlier this month on the financial impact of relegation on West Ham. The cut in season ticket prices will cost the club up to around £16 million, by my back-of-the-envelope calculation, but that is an investment in forestalling a decline in attendance similar to that that followed its last relegation to the Championship. Having its peppercorn rent on the taxpayer-owned stadium halved will help.
https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7294207/2026/05/21/west-ham-london-stadium-relegation-cost-2-5m/
C100@39: I saw an interesting suggestion that Tuchel should not play his Arsenal and other big names who have had 50-game seasons in the group stage, so they can have a break from competitive football before the tournament starts in earnest in the knock-out rounds. That could be a smart move, but it would take some bottle on the part of Tuchel or any other manager to do it.
There are probably at least a dozen players on Blog’s list representing countries that could go deep into the World Cup. Some of them will likely have to miss the early part of next season, so they can get a proper break and avoid breakdown. With a Nations League next summer, Declan Rice could potentially be playing around 120 competitive games in two years. Crazy.
How the fixture list for next season breaks in its opening weeks may have a big impact on whether we retain the title.
Lovely piece in the Guardian about how Arsenal became home for so many black players and fans.
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2026/may/26/how-arsenal-became-a-home-for-black-fans?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
Paul Davis of course, but no mention of Raphael Meade or Chris Whyte? I remember Terry Neill / Don Howe giving all three their debuts in or around the same time. Those post Brady years were tough sledding. Ray Hankin & John Hawley for goodness sake!
@42 thanks C100, a good article and I enjoyed but I think as U4GN mentions the seeds of that culture were sown earlier and of course on the terraces in the 70s as older gooners have mentioned in here before.
SP@35: Those clips brought back some memories — of big hair and padded shoulders.
Ned@45- In 1989 I had both.
CER@46: 🙂
Hizzoner, that’s the mayor of New York, to you, Zohran Mamdani, famously a big Arsenal fan, wore an away-kit-themed kurta during Eid al-Adha prayers in the Bronx.
https://pict.sindonews.com/dyn/850/pena/news/2026/05/28/11/1711515/zohran-mamdani-salat-idul-adha-dengan-jubah-arsenal-jop.jpg
Clubs with at least 100 million followers on social media
We seem to be losing the social media war.
I thought we had quite a lot of global support but perhaps
they are not socially media inclined,
It seems Timber completed a full training session, welcome
good news! Straight into the team for me but let’s see what
MA thinks.
Well in for the half-ton, OM.
We’re still top ten on social media but a long way behind the Spanish giants. In NYC, you see tons of folks in Madrid and Barca shirts but rarely any in the red and white — and not many in the other clubs’ shirts either. The Oil-lands blue of New York City FC is probably the next most commonly spotted.
Ned ,
Are you convinced by the accuracy of those figures ? The level of interest in Arsenal is to my mind much greater at Arsenal than Tottenham and Chelsea . Arsenal have developed huge followings in Africa and Asia . I’m not convinced that C130y are followed by that many on social media worldwide
TTG@53: I don’t doubt the accuracy of the numbers. They are public-facing counts of followers/subscribers to the official accounts of all the clubs on those five social media. Some poor intern or agentic AI just had to look each one up and bung them into a spreadsheet. Assuming no data entry errors, they will be correct, at least, as of when they were collated. That was earlier in May, it seems. Since then, the Arsenal numbers have increased by about 1 million across all the socials. Social media users latching onto the shiny new thing? Surely not…
The question is, what do they measure? To your point, they may be a poor reflection of the size of the global fanbase. I doubt anyone has any idea of what share of all Arsenal social channels is accounted for by the club’s channels, or how that compares to the ratio for other clubs. Beyond that, to what extent does following a club’s account translate into being a full-on Gooner?
To your other point about the club’s large following in Asia and Africa, those folks may just not be on the five socials being counted. X has only about 8 million users in Nigeria, a country with a population of 240 million, for example, but I would bet that there are many more than 8 million Arsenal fans in the country. The use of the big US social media platforms is not as pervasive outside North America and Europe as you might instinctively think. 1 in 3 Americans has an active X account; the figure for Nigeria is 1 in 30.
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