Arsenal did it

I'm not crying, you're crying

Arsenal are the 2025-2026 Premier League Champions.

That feels good, doesn’t it?

And yet, despite delivering the best result any Arsenal league campaign has seen in 22 years, many will remember this campaign as being fraught with adversity, close shaves and not-quite-good enough football. But is that really descriptive of what happened? Like, at all?

Listen, there were moments. Dominating Wolves but falling short at the very end tested the mettle of yours truly, my dear reader.

But the persistent thread throughout the season was the expectation — based on previous seasons, with previous versions of Arsenal and previous versions of City and previous versions of “good attacking play” — was always based on something that wasn’t happening here and now.

Did Arsenal blow the doors off everyone? Absolutely not. But we did our best here at Cannon Stats to remind folks of just what was transpiring on the pitch, and just where Arsenal were stacking up in real time. Scott reminded us all just a month ago that no, Arsenal weren’t falling apart:

All Arsenal have done since then: Win the Premier League, and qualify for the Champions League final. And sure, losses to Bournemouth and City kicked off the stretch right after Scott posted the above, but Arsenal haven’t even allowed an open-play goal since Erling Haaland scored his winner in the 65th minute at the Etihad.

I haven’t been at my most prolific down the stretch. Part of that has been pure nerves about what would happen, part is being a Dad and having Dad Stuff to do while also being too busy at work, and part of it was getting sick of making the same point over and over again. Here’s what I wrote in January, after we lost to United and many said the title charge was done and dusted:

That piece concluded with the below:

And I think that’s really the lesson of this season: One day is not the full season. City blowing someone up this week doesn’t mean they’re gonna do it for the rest of the season, particularly when they’ve got large, identifiable holes (Mateo Kovacic started today). Arsenal dropping a turd doesn’t mean they’re going to every week from here out, either.

Lessons aside: Arsenal missed Bukayo Saka for nearly a third of the PL campaign, Martin Ødegaard for about half, and Kai Havertz played only a third of the campaign. Famous(ly poor) results such as Wolves featured Piero Hincapié starting instead of Arsenal’s usual brick walls at the back. And they still won the entire damn thing. No City comeback, no Arsenal bottle, no doubt about it.

We wrap the entire Premier League season on Sunday with Arsenal atop the table. That feels pretty damn incredible. We’ll work to turn out some good content in the immediate wake of that match, including looks ahead to summer, some teams of the season type of stuff I’m planning, final position ranks and more.

Before we do, let me be clearer that ever that we love each and every one of you for supporting our site, and we’ll keep working hard to provide key context and bigger picture analysis and earn your subscription.

UP THE GUNNERS. 2025-26 CHAMPS!