If you were to ask Pep Guardiola, Arsenal are “the best team in the world”. Brighton boss Fabian Hurzeler screams at them to “f***ing play football”. It is fair to say the ability to grind out wins can divide opinion.
Over two-and-a-half years in north London, Declan Rice has got used to all the noise. First, the £100m fee, then three successive title races. Arsenal are on the cusp of a first Premier League trophy in 22 years – and should there one day be history books written on this season, his set pieces will be among the first chapters. There can be no doubt as to their effectiveness.
“We’ve got something we’re really good at – so much goes into it, it’s not just we whip in a corner and someone heads it in,” Rice tells The i Paper.
“Execution, the timing, what we plan has to be bang on the money for us to score a goal – and we’ve done that many times this season. So credit to all of us because they’re long meetings going through set pieces, doing it on the pitch, repetition.
“Every team changes the way they play and the way they defend against us, so it’s on us to find ways to score and we’ve been doing that.”
Arteta-ball is quite clearly being emulated across the country. No other team has enjoyed the same results: 19 set-piece goals, with Manchester United, Tottenham and Newcastle closest behind on 15.
“It comes from us, the way we set up and then everyone talks about it and then everyone does it – so it’s confusing!” Rice says.
“But they’re not doing it to the level that we do it. You can see that when you’re seeing teams take corners. We can still get better and that’s the good thing about it.”
This could well turn into Rice’s greatest season. His first at Arsenal, upon arriving from West Ham in 2023, produced seven goals and eight assists. He is currently on four and five respectively, with the Gunners still in four competitions. Does he pay attention to those stats either way? Yes and no.
“I’ve been in and out of that in my career, to be honest. I was probably worried about my numbers, then not worried about the numbers.
“In your career, I don’t think you ever know what you’re going to go on to achieve. As the seasons evolve and you’re playing week in, week out, and the game gets better and better, there can end up being no limits to what you can achieve.”
Rice’s own evolution into a No 8 is partly a result of how the pieces of Arsenal’s midfield have shifted around him. At first, he operated most regularly with Thomas Partey (58 appearances together) and Jorginho (48). Both have since moved on. He has forged a new partnership with Martin Zubimendi that has added “different bits to my game”.
Zubimendi, he argues, is a “typical Spanish No 6”.
“He moves the ball so well through the lines, keeps it calm, simple, a real calm presence who’s won a lot in his career already”. The other alliance which may yet prove to be the most important of his career is a burgeoning one with Elliot Anderson, the “high-energy” England teammate set to partner him at the World Cup.
“We’re like a hybrid of each other really,” he says of Anderson. “We both play six, we both play eight, both love to attack the box, defend the box. He’s a player I really admire.”
Rice is currently odds on to win the PFA Player of the Year, having already been named Men’s Footballer of the Year at the London Football Awards. And should they win the Premier League or Champions League, this Arsenal team will go down as one of the club’s greatest ever. The players are well aware of “what you can become” if they deliver either of those, Rice admits.
Then, inevitably, there are Ballon d’Or rumours, which he laughs off.
“That is far, far away. There’s still so long to go in the season, need to win a few trophies, need to keep playing well. I don’t get caught up in it, just try to live in the moment. Keep playing football and see what happens.”
The curious thing about the focus on his attacking stats – and the fixation on Arsenal’s goalscoring more generally – is that it can lead to other aspects of a potentially title-winning side being overlooked.
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In games like the 1-0 victory over Brighton, which prompted Hurzeler’s comments, the aim is still always to “play good football, exciting football”.
“Sometimes you’re going to have games where it isn’t going to be that for obvious reasons,” Rice says. “One, if you don’t play well, two, the opposition do something to stop you playing well. We play against good teams, good managers, that’s the reality of the Premier League.
“We didn’t play the best against Brighton – it’s down to them to find a way to score against a team that didn’t play well. We kept it strong – an amazing part of our game is defensive solidity. We’ve got different ways of winning – and we’ll keep using them.”
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