Arsenal dares to dream of a historic double after Arteta's European breakthrough

Tuesday's 1-0 win over Atletico Madrid at the Emirates did more than send Arsenal into their first Champions League final in 20 years. 

It pushed the club to the edge of immortality. Bukayo Saka's close-range goal sealed a 2-1 aggregate triumph and set off wild celebrations in North London, where Arteta, his players, and 60,000 supporters all seemed to sense that this season has become something far bigger than a good run. Arsenal is now just four matches away from making history. 

Three more Premier League wins, against West Ham, Burnley, and Crystal Palace, would deliver their first English title since 2004. 

Then comes Budapest on May 30, where Arsenal will face either Paris Saint-Germain or Bayern Munich with the chance to win the Champions League for the first time in club history. 

No matter who waits there, Arsenal will go with momentum, emotion , and a growing sense that this may be their moment. 

PSG, the defending champions who knocked Arsenal out in last season's semi-finals, took a 5-4 lead into Wednesday's return leg in Munich. But Arteta made it clear after eliminating Atletico that his team should focus less on the opponent and more on the force they are building inside themselves.

"Tremendous. Everybody could feel the shift in the energy, the belief, in everything," he said. 

That shift was impossible to miss. Even by Arteta's own usually animated standards, he was bursting with emotion as he celebrated with his players after the final whistle. From the moment thousands of supporters lined the streets outside the stadium to welcome the team bus with red flares, flags , and roaring chants, it was obvious this was not a normal night at the Emirates. 

Arteta wants the players to use that feeling, not get lost in it. 

"Use it in the right way and understand that the margins and the difficulty of what we are trying to achieve are huge, but we have the capacity and the belief to do it." 

That is now the challenge. Arsenal has earned the right to dream, but they are also walking the thin line between inspiration and distraction. Arteta knows the danger of emotions running too high too early, which is why he quickly shifted the focus toward the next league game. 

"I am going to really enjoy tonight ; everybody is enjoying the moment. But the emotion is not too high and not too low. My job is to keep the stability." 

That balance could decide everything. 

"We have a really important game against West Ham, a really difficult one, and we have four days to prepare for that game." 

It is that tension that makes this so compelling. More than 20 years have passed since Arsene Wenger's Invincibles won the title in 2004, and Arsenal's last great chance at European glory ended in heartbreak against Barcelona in the 2006 Champions League final. Wenger never quite got back there. 

Arteta may now have done what nobody else at Arsenal has managed since. After more than six years of work, setbacks, and near-misses, he appears to have rebuilt not only a team but a bond between squad and supporters that had been fraying for years. Since the FA Cup win in 2020, there have been flashes of promise, but this season feels different. 

This feels complete. Winning both the Champions League and the Premier League in the same season would represent the greatest campaign in the club's 140-year history. 

Arteta was happy to turn the spotlight onto his players, admitting he never imagined when he took his first managerial job in 2019 that he would come this close to something so extraordinary. 

"They are the ones who have to produce performances like this. I really did not imagine it because, at the beginning, we were not even in Europe. This is a big achievement," he said. 

"We have built it step by step. We believed in what we wanted to do. Now we have to sustain it." 

That may be the clearest summary of Arsenal's rise. This has not been a sudden burst or a lucky run. It has been built patiently, layer by layer, until the club now finds itself standing on the brink of something that could redefine the modern era at the Emirates. 

"It was a beautiful night. We have made history again together , and I could not be happier and prouder of everybody involved in this football club," Arteta said. 

He reserved special praise for the supporters , too. 

"The fans were there with us on every single ball. They made the game special and unique, and I have not experienced that at this stadium before." 

That matters because this run is no longer only about tactics or form. It is about a club that can suddenly see the biggest prizes again and a manager who has made Arsenal believe they are truly ready to take them. 

"We know what it means for everybody ; we gave everything, the boys did a great job." 

Now comes the hardest part. Turning that belief into the final four wins that would change everything.