The values carried by the Arsenal players from 1989 who I got to know changed something in me massively. I arrived with my socks above my knees. Some of the guys were looking at me. Why are you going with that? Are you a ballet dancer? But that was me. I took everything that was needed to be taken in order to play at Arsenal even though I also wanted to be me.
I always say they kicked me into understanding what Arsenal Football Club was. It’s a heavy shirt. Once you know your shoulders are OK to wear it then you can go on to do some amazing stuff. Tony Adams, Lee Dixon, Martin Keown, Nigel Winterburn, David Seaman, Ray Parlour – all of those guys told me what it was to play for Arsenal Football Club. That was very important because they know the history of the club, because they genuinely loved Arsenal. I remember when I arrived they knew the names of everybody at the training ground, at Highbury, and the name of the fans sometimes. I was like, ‘What? You know that guy?’
‘Yeah, yeah,’ they said. ‘He used to travel all the time and is always there.’ So, it was a family club, but being a family club didn’t mean less competitive. It was about winning and only about winning, and they were letting you know.
They had been part of something special. You can never say never but to be able to reproduce what happened that night in 1989 is virtually impossible. Everybody’s watching that game. To have two teams going for a title. First versus second. The only game on TV. No one else is playing. You have to win 2–0 away at Anfield – something that wasn’t happening at the time. Even then you would only win the league because of the amount of goals you scored over the whole season. You thought you blew it. You come back to take it to the last day of the season. It’s you against them. Nothing else. I don’t care what people are saying, that’s the best ending ever of any league I’ve ever seen. Period.
When you watch the game you can clearly see that Arsenal thought that they could do it and that Liverpool were more thinking, let’s not lose it. It’s weird because you would like to think that the Liverpool side would know how to close the game out, especially at home. Anfield. Sometimes the fear of winning is bigger than the fear of losing. Anyone can get trapped in it.
People do forget that Alan Smith scored in that game. People remember Michael Thomas at the end, obviously, but to be able to score that crucial second goal you need to score the first one. When Michael Thomas goes through in stoppage time, with a situation of that intensity, the best thing is not to think about what’s at stake. There was a ricochet and then he goes through. He’s in front of the goalkeeper. When you don’t think sometimes it’s way better.
When I arrived at Arsenal I was always playing against these guys in training and at first I didn’t understand what the boss was trying to do. I thought, is he trying to expose my weaknesses here? What is he doing? But then I soon understood that he wanted me to play against the best to get better. Those guys are not going to greet you with ‘Oh hello, you won things before. Welcome. Do you want a cup of tea?’ No. Now we’re going to try to see who you are. Can you play here? We saw that you can play somewhere. Here is different. I remember some games where I wasn’t putting my foot into challenges the way some of the senior players wanted me to. If I was in France it would have been all right but in England then it was not the right way to go into a challenge and so they were letting me know. At half-time. After the game. Pretty much in your face.
In training I had those guys playing against me and I said to myself, if you can deal with those guys you can deal with everybody. I took it as a challenge every day in training to be able to beat those guys and that was like a competition. They used to kick me. I used to look at them as if to say, you can kick me but it doesn’t matter. Go on, you won’t stop me.
The point is them playing at their best made me the player that I became. When I was waking up I knew I’m going to face Lee, Martin, Tony, Nigel and you can add Sol Campbell a bit after that. You have to be ready. You have to wake up early and be ready for that one. I took it as a challenge. They were testing you. Can you play with us? Can you wear the Arsenal shirt? You find yourself in a situation where that’s the only way you can find out. I think you always have to train in extreme conditions to be able to survive in the game and they were giving me every morning extreme conditions. Can you take an elbow in your face and are you going to moan about it or are you going to play? I’m going to leave something on your ankle, or on your knee. That’s the way it is. Get up and fight and play.
The cannon on the shirt means everything. First and foremost when you go into a club you need to understand everything in order to be able to feel something. If you don’t, you’re not meant to be in that dressing room and that’s what those guys taught me.