Arsenal

The club

Arsenal were founded in October 1886 as Dial Square, by munitions workers at the Royal Arsenal in Woolwich. They became Royal Arsenal in January 1887 and Woolwich Arsenal on joining the Football League in 1893. In 1913 the club moved north of the river to Arsenal Stadium in Highbury, where they stayed for 93 years, and in July 2006 to the Emirates Stadium in Islington, which holds 60,704. They are the Gunners, and have worn bright red shirts with white sleeves and white shorts since 1933.

Recent seasons

Arsenal are the reigning champions of England. They won the 2025/26 Premier League with 85 points from 26 wins, 7 draws and 5 defeats, scoring 71 and conceding 27, seven clear of Manchester City. The title was secured on 19 May 2026. It was the club's 14th league championship and their first since 2003/04. They also reached the Champions League final and lost it to Paris Saint-Germain on penalties, 4-3, after the match finished level.

The two seasons before that were both near misses. Arsenal were runners-up in 2023/24 with 89 points, two behind Manchester City and the third-best second-placed total in Premier League history, and runners-up again in 2024/25 with 74 points, ten behind Liverpool. Going further back, they finished eighth in 2019/20 with 56 points but won the FA Cup that season. Positions for 2020/21 through 2022/23 were not verified from the sources consulted and are not stated here.

Honours and landmarks

Fourteen league titles, fourteen FA Cups, which is the competition record, two League Cups and seventeen Community Shields. In Europe, the Cup Winners' Cup of 1993/94 and the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup of 1969/70. The Champions League has still not been won; the 2026 final was the club's second defeat in it.

The record that defines the club is the 2003/04 season, when Arsenal took the title without losing a Premier League match, and the 49-game unbeaten league run either side of it, from 7 May 2003 to 16 October 2004. David O'Leary holds the appearance record with 722 competitive matches between 1975 and 1993. Thierry Henry is the all-time leading scorer with 228 goals. Record attendance at Highbury was 73,295 against Sunderland in the First Division on 9 March 1935; the Emirates record is 60,383 against Wolverhampton Wanderers in the Premier League on 2 November 2019. The record fee paid is £100m for Declan Rice from West Ham United on 15 July 2023. The record fee received is £35m, taken twice, for Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain to Liverpool in 2017 and Folarin Balogun to Monaco in 2023; nothing sold this summer approached it.

Notable scorelines

Record win in all competitions: 12-0 against Ashford United in the FA Cup on 14 October 1893. Record league win: 12-0 against Loughborough in the Second Division on 12 March 1900. Record defeat: 8-0 at Loughborough in the Second Division on 12 December 1896, against the same opponents who supply the record league win. The most recent match of consequence is the 2026 Champions League final, level after extra time and lost 4-3 on penalties to Paris Saint-Germain.

Head-to-head notes

Arsenal do not publish all-time head-to-head records in a form that could be retrieved, and no all-time record was established against any 2026/27 Premier League club. Nothing is asserted in their place. What is on record is last season's table. Arsenal finished above all nineteen of their opponents in 2025/26: Manchester City on 78, Manchester United on 71, Aston Villa on 65, Liverpool on 60, Bournemouth on 57, Sunderland on 54, Brighton and Brentford on 53, Chelsea and Fulham on 52, Newcastle United and Everton on 49, Leeds United on 47, Crystal Palace on 45, Nottingham Forest on 44 and Tottenham Hotspur on 41. Coventry City, Hull City and Ipswich Town come up from the Championship, and no recent league record against Coventry or Hull was established; Arsenal and Ipswich last shared a division in 2024/25. Manchester City are the immediate opponents in the Community Shield.

Right now (2026/27)

Mikel Arteta remains the manager, appointed on 20 December 2019, and 2026/27 is his seventh full season. The summer was deliberately quiet for a champion side. Piero Hincapie's loan from Bayer Leverkusen was made permanent on 1 July 2026 for £34.5m. Goalkeeper Illan Meslier joined free from Leeds United on 9 July, and defender Elijah Upson free from Tottenham Hotspur on 21 July. The one substantial addition to the attack was Christos Tzolis from Club Brugge on 23 July for £34.0m; he scored 22 goals in Belgium last season.

Three players left. Goalkeeper Karl Hein went to Werder Bremen for £2.6m on 1 July, Jakub Kiwior to Porto the same day for £14.6m plus £4.3m in add-ons, and Leandro Trossard to Besiktas on 15 July for £15.4m plus £1.6m. Net spend across the window was £35.9m. No loans out were recorded.

The English season starts late this year. Arsenal's only competitive fixture before the league is the FA Community Shield against Manchester City on Sunday 16 August 2026 at 3pm, played at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff because Wembley is hosting a concert. Pre-season included a 3-0 win over Milton Keynes Dons at London Colney on 25 July 2026. The Premier League campaign opens at home to Coventry City on Friday 21 August 2026 at 8pm. Arsenal also enter the FA Cup and EFL Cup at the third round and the Champions League at the league phase.

Sources

Researched and written for not4quarters. Where a fact could not be established from the sources read, this page says so rather than guessing.