Arteta must revive relationship with fans as much as Arsenal’s fortunes on the pitch
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With Tottenham next up at the Emirates, Arsenal manager must restore the positivity of the 2022-23 season. Mikel Arteta was sitting in the Emirates Stadium away dugout when he realised the scale of the task that awaited him. It was December 2019, and although he was still nominally the assistant manager of Manchester City, cruising to a 3-0 victory against Arsenal, thoughts were naturally beginning to turn towards the project he had secretly decided to take on. And – to put it mildly – he was alarmed.
![[Jonathan Liew]](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/uploads/2019/11/25/Jonathan_Liew.png?width=75&dpr=1&s=none&crop=none)
This wasn’t simply a case of how bad Arsenal were on the pitch. Performance is a fickle thing. There are known variables, measurable objectives. Performance you can fix. But the energy in the stadium, the disgruntlement, the disconnect between the players on the pitch and the fans in the stands: as Arteta contemplated his first job in management, this was the challenge that worried him the most.
![[Mikel Arteta gives final instructions before the penalty shootout against Manchester United in the FA Cup]](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/52338d7a46c62c65283d6c96ba534a8692fb2230/0_138_6384_3831/master/6384.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none&crop=none)
And for all the focus on Arteta’s attention to detail, the fixation on things such as set pieces and defensive spacing, at root he is a vibes coach: someone who thinks deeply about the relationship between the performers and their paying public, the synergy and the magic they can conjure together, the ingredients that create them. “Energy is everything, in life and in football,” he has said.
It’s fair to assume, then, that as Arsenal trooped from the pitch at half-time during their FA Cup game against Manchester United on Sunday, Arteta will not have been oblivious to the absence of warmth. To describe the Emirates as quiet barely does it justice: this was a kind of anti-noise, not so much anger or sadness as tautness, a pregnant vacuum, a stadium basically devoid of stimulus, drained of feeling. And as Arsenal threaten to stumble in pursuit of the league title that would define this group of players, this is becoming an increasing problem.
