In this day and age, fans do not often get intimate or personal exchanges with players. Some of us are lucky enough to see them on a football pitch in the stadium, most glimpse them through screens- be that television or internet. So if you ever have a small interaction with a player at close quarters, you will totally over extrapolate your experience.
This is true of all celebrities really. If someone is slightly moonfaced and having a bad day and you ask them for a photo and they are a little reluctant it will likely inform your opinion of them to an absurd degree. Likewise if they cheerfully accept or are obliging. Again, that will totally inform your impression of them and you will probably repeat it to a lot of people.
I have had a couple of absurdly small experiences of Arsenal players up close in recent years and have over indexed them in much the same way. In 2022, when Arsenal celebrated their Women’s Euro 2022 and Copa America Femenina winners at London Colney with the whole staff I was invited along as media.
There was a small rabble of us who were there for the same reason, stood alongside the men’s first team squad and staff in a crescent as we waited for Leah Williamson, Lotte Wubben-Moy, Beth Mead and Rafaelle to emerge. Obviously, we all felt a little awkward and out of place. Granit Xhaka walked over, shook each of us by the hand and said, ‘good morning.’ I probably don’t need to tell you that Xhaka looks you in the eye when he shakes your hand.
A small interaction but an impressive one and it entirely accorded with everything we have been told about Xhaka’s leadership and I have hugely over extrapolated it in my mind. Another such moment happened around 18 months ago when I went to interview Leah Williamson at London Colney. As I was shown into the building, the men’s team were just emerging for training.
A few players filed past as I tried to remain poker faced. Leandro Trossard emerged side-by-side with Bukayo Saka. I only heard about three to four seconds of what was being said. I can’t even remember the exact words. But Trossard was firmly explaining to Saka about looking for him on the back post more often. Saka was listening and it was clear from his face that he listened with a little mirth.
I loved this tiny glimpse because Saka’s reaction suggested that this wasn’t the first conversation of this sort he had enjoyed / endured with Trossard. I also really liked it because it accorded with my image of Trossard. Here he was, side by side with Arsenal’s golden boy and ‘franchise player’, being demanding and maybe even a little bossy.
Mikel Arteta jokingly referred to Trossard as ‘grumpy’ in training a couple of seasons ago, to which Trossard replied, ‘When I lose a game, I can get quite upset. I just have the mentality I want to win everything, if it’s football or not, if it’s games at home where I play with my family, my kids, whatever. So I think it’s a bit there. I would moan at the referee in training, and I would tell them off as well.’
Apart from feeling slightly sorry for his children, I think this is the sort of irritability that supporters can get on board with. A player who is motivated and demanding and backs that up with his performances on the pitch. It also reminded me of Aaron Ramsdale’s comments on Trossard shortly after his signing from Brighton in January 2023.
‘Trossard’s coming in to take someone’s place, in his head,’ Ramsdale said. ‘It might look like he’s coming to be part of the squad, but deep down, like I was with Leno, I’ve come to take Leno’s place. He is coming to take one of the front three player’s place.’ Clearly Trossard arrived at the club with a reputation for surliness having fallen out with then Brighton manager Roberto de Zerbi.
In hindsight, it is not difficult to understand how a pair of Silverbacks like de Zerbi and Trossard might fall out. (It also clear who I would be more inclined to side with!) De Zerbi is no shrinking violet and I imagine Trossard is the type of person who lets you know when he is not happy. After coming off the bench to score a crucial goal away at Aston Villa last August, Trossard celebrated in an even more cantankerous away than usual. (He was actually briefly linked with a move away during that period).
It was clear that being left on the bench for the game made him angry. And you wouldn’t like him when he is angry. Though I bet Mikel Arteta really does. Trossard’s cantankerousness elevates his cult hero credentials, which are already sky high. He was a Plan B signing after Arsenal, bizarrely in hindsight, became involved in a bidding war with Chelsea for Mykhailo Mudryk.
Arsenal pivoted to Trossard as a ‘market opportunity.’ With only a few months remaining on his Brighton contract and a clear case of foul air between him and his manager, the Gunners capitalised. I recall the fee (around £27m) being understandably questioned at the time, given his age and contract situation. That debate did not endure. Absolutely nobody would question the value for money on that exchange now.
The fact that Trossard was a surprise signing and the fact that Mudryk has experienced such a sad downturn have only amplified the mythology around Trossard that I believe will endure for many years. A scorer of enormously ‘clutch’ goals, Trossard had that Freddie Ljungberg knack of arriving at the right time and applying the right finish at the right moment.
I have written extensively about his qualities as a player several times over the last few years and he has become a firm favourite of mine, as well as many other Arsenal fans. Even last season, when his end product dipped significantly over a few months (which is surely factored into the decision to sell him this summer) he scored possibly the most iconic goal of the season away at West Ham.
It wasn’t officially the goal that clinched the title for Arsenal but I think in the years to come it will be viewed that way. I think he shares something in common with his manager in that he got his move to Arsenal pretty late in his career when he possibly didn’t think a move like that was on the cards and, like his manager, he played like a man who didn’t have much time to make the most of it.
His slightly plasticine features (he simultaneously looks like a racoon, Robbie Williams and Lurch from the Addams Family) and shock of grey hair, his waspishness and the surprise over his signing all make for immaculate cult hero qualifications. One of the best signings of the Arteta era and someone who will be remembered fondly in the years to come. Trossard again, ole ole.
