Shopping at Harrods!

“Manchester City have pulled out of the Declan Rice race…” – as soon as the Ornstein bomb hit my timeline I fell to my knees, looked up at the heavens, threw my hands up in the air and shouted an almighty fuck you to Pep Guardiola and his treble winning machine. No, I didn’t do all that, but I definitely muttered a fuck you under my breath to that entire Sheikh-run operation.

Arsenal have financially outmuscled a state-sponsored machinery. They have stunned their own fans, and completely rattled the opposition ones. People are now accusing Arsenal of overspending, blaming them for inflating the market. Oh my days! This is what I always craved for – the rich brat taunts! The Gunners aren’t broke anymore. Stan is now a sugar daddy. Rice has rejected Bayern Munich, Manchester City, Manchester United, Chelsea (I am not really sure if he has, but am still saying it, because what the heck!) to join Mikel Arteta’s tricky reds! Arsenal are back! We are so back, babbeeh! (tip: say it like Coach Beard)

However, there’s a feeling of guilt as well. It’s weird but my happiness has given way to confusion. What the fuck do we do with such an expensive buy? My friends and colleagues who support other big clubs are used to it. For them 80, 90, 100 mils are par for course. For us, it’s Nico Pepe. We aren’t used to this madness, FFS! We are used to Arsene Wenger’s bargain buys, a 45 million war chest. Make no mistake, there have been big signings before – we coughed up 50 million each for Alex Lacazette and Ben White, paid a pretty price for Pierre Emerick Aubameyang and now Kai Havertz, but none matched the drama of the deadline day grab of Mesut Ozil. Sol Campbell for free was dramatic AF, but dropping 100 mils on a coveted England international entering his peak is pure cinema.

This is unfamiliar territory for every Arsenal fan. We’ve finally bought that ONE player who might propel us in a new era. This might be our Van Dijk moment and we definitely should be super dramatic about it. But now, we have to take care of our prized possession as well. And that’s where the old-penny-pinching Arsenal fan guilt kicks in. I feel guilty that we spent so much money on Just.One.Player. Think how many Francis Coquelins, Denilsons and Chamakhs we could have bought for that amount.

Over the years we’ve screamed, “spend some fucking money” at the Kroenkes. Now they have. Other clubs used to gazump us all the time. We are the new gazumpers! We’ve never ‘cooked’ in the transfer market, but Edu’s barbeque grill has caught fire this summer, and Arsenal have spent a 100 million British goddamn fucking pounds on a single player. Listen, we shop at Harrods now: it’s nice, enjoy it, get familiar to it. The price tags will make us twitch, but that’s how the big boys play. You don’t walk into high-stakes poker wearing your khakis, you put on a tux! Mikel Arteta is gearing up for phase four, and after winning the Super Bowls, Stanley cups, and the NBA, the Kroenkes are going all in. Welcome to the new Arsenal – it’s not about paying off debts anymore, it’s about competing at the top end. It’s about winning. It’s about winning, NOW!