Arsènal

In the dying embers of the 1995/96 season two post-80th minute strikes from a pair of expensive Italian imports, David Platt and Dennis Bergkamp, secured a 2-1 victory over Bolton and sent Highbury into raptures at the prospect of a fifth place finish and UEFA Cup football. Thirteen years on, after the supposedly underwhelming return of Champions League and FA Cup semi-finals, Arsène Wenger’s dispirited summing up of the 2008/09 campaign (that also secured a twelfth consecutive crack at the Champions League) was that “I have never worked so hard or been criticised so much.”

How had events reached such an impasse? Here are four new chapters which attempt to explain, with the help of the key protagonists, the fissures in what was believed to be a love story without end and how – with both parties wary of what they might wish for – a reconciliation was effected. At least for the immediate future. Arsène Wenger’s current contract expires in 2011.