The 2025\u201326 campaign was framed by one clear objective: reclaiming the Premier League after three consecutive second-place finishes and a distant runners-up finish the previous season. Arsenal installed greater squad depth over the summer and, despite imperfections, built a team capable of competing on multiple fronts.<\/p>\n
Defensively the side was outstanding. David Raya won a third consecutive Golden Glove and the central pairing of William Saliba and Gabriel formed the backbone of a rearguard that conceded just 27 times in the Premier League, Arsenal\u2019s lowest under Arteta. Saliba made 50 appearances across all competitions and emerged as the season\u2019s standout, his recovery speed and composure on the ball repeatedly easing pressure on the team. Honorable mentions on defence included David Raya, Gabriel and Declan Rice.<\/p>\n
Youth also made a defining contribution. Sixteen-year-old Max Dowman became the competition\u2019s youngest ever goalscorer when his late header against Everton secured a 2-0 win that pushed Arsenal 10 points clear at the summit. Dowman\u2019s breakthrough followed limited senior minutes but underlined the academy\u2019s influence on the title run.<\/p>\n
Up front, Viktor Gy\u00f6keres finished as Arsenal\u2019s leading scorer with 21 goals in all competitions, 14 of them in the Premier League. The Swede produced important performances late in the season and in Europe, though he remained a substitute in the Champions League final.<\/p>\n
Arsenal dominated the Champions League group stage, winning all eight games and overcoming teams including Atl\u00e9tico Madrid and Inter Milan. Their best European display came against Bayern Munich, where Arsenal outperformed the visitors with 3.05 xG to Bayern\u2019s 0.79. The continental run ended in heartbreak in the final against Paris Saint-Germain. Kai Havertz gave Arsenal the lead, Mosquera was caught out by Khvicha Kvaratskhelia, Ousmane Demb\u00e9l\u00e9 levelled from the penalty spot and a shootout defeat denied Arsenal a first major European title since 2006.<\/p>\n
Cristhian Mosquera, signed from Valencia for $17.5 million (\u00a313 million), made 35 appearances with 20 starts in his first season. Overall, Arsenal finished the 2025\/26 season as Premier League champions, Champions League runners-up and FA Cup quarterfinalists.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Arsenal reclaimed the Premier League, lost the Champions League on penalties, Saliba stood out. 2025.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14135,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[192,1647,969],"tags":[1446,1162,1484],"class_list":["post-14136","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arsenal","category-champions-league","category-premier-league","tag-academy","tag-analytics","tag-appearance-record"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14136","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14136"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14136\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14135"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14136"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14136"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14136"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}