The book is perhaps most interesting on Wenger’s early life and career – as this is little covered elsewhere. Another area that is perhaps even clearer from the book than I already thought it was is how the Invincible Season was an extremely deliberate and very explicit target (and it was interesting to read this part only 5/6 games into the 2020-21 season when already every team in the Premiership has lost). Full disclosure, I have been an Arsenal fan for over 50 years, and an Arsene Wenger fan since the day I saw him announced as our manager on the Jumbotron at Highbury in 1996. I was devastated when he eventually left Arsenal, even though I knew the day had to come sometime.

Wenger was born in 1949, grew up in a village in Alsace, eastern France, and had an early insight into human psychology watching the patrons of the bistro that his parents ran. “Alcohol, brawling, violence, everything that used to scare or disgust me as a child,” he recalls in My Life in Red and White, his new autobiography. He became a hard-grafting midfielder, eventually playing for Strasbourg in France’s top division, but he always thought deeply, even obsessively, about the game, and in his early 30s he moved organically into coaching, first at Cannes and Nancy then Monaco and in Japan at Nagoya Grampus Eight. I don’t know why but football games are my life and I don’t think that’s ever going to change I was disgusted at Arsene's hounding by the press after a vicious journalist spread lies which although totally unfounded resulted in his 12 year old step-son being hounded. This hurt him deeply.

There are a million questions that Arsenal fans would want Wenger to answer. The answers, unfortunately, are either missing altogether from My Life in Red and White, or expressed in a way that is long familiar to us: the English players stopped drinking and eating Mars bars; he used to have his ups and downs with Ferguson but they get on fine now. Meanwhile Mourinho, who cast a long shadow over some of Wenger’s most difficult years, appears once in the book, in a table provided at the end showing his head-to-head record against rival managers. (Wenger beat Steve McClaren 83.3% of the time; he beat Mourinho 10% of the time.) The one that hurts the most and that I’ve never been able to watch again since is the match in the 2006 final against Barça,” he says of the night in Paris, in which Arsenal lost 2-1. “Victory in the Champions League would have been a wonderful end to the adventure of the Invincibles, rewarding all the efforts made by the players and the club during the construction of the new stadium.” He was even more involved in the small details of his previous clubs An exceptional book about an exceptional human being. This book written by football journalist John Cross gives great insight into the man who managed Arsenal for twenty years and the behind the scenes efforts to make Arsenal one of the biggest clubs in the world. Wenger has not returned to the sidelines since leaving Arsenal, but as of November he has brought characteristic rigour to his role as Fifa’s head of Global Football Development. He separated from his wife, Annie Brosterhous, in 2015; their daughter Léa is finishing a doctorate in neuroscience at Cambridge University. He divides his time between London, Paris and Fifa’s base in Zurich, often staying in hotels, and he admits that the hardest part of Covid-19 for him was when most of the leagues around the world were suspended. “I don’t know why but football games are my life and I don’t think that’s ever going to change,” he says. “So I missed it very much.”

In My Life in Red and White, Wenger charts his extraordinary career, including his rise in France and Japan where he managed Nancy, Monaco and Nagoya Grampus Eight (clubs that also play in red-and-white, like Arsenal!) to his 22 years at the helm of an internationally renowned club from 1996 onwards. He describes the unrest that led to his resignation in 2018, and his current role as Chief of Global Football Development for FIFA. You may also opt to downgrade to Standard Digital, a robust journalistic offering that fulfils many user’s needs. Compare Standard and Premium Digital here.Hostility no, competition yes. It was vital [at Arsenal] that you beat Tottenham for the respect of the club. Competition is important, as long as it’s not crazy. When you [were due to] play Tottenham, at the start of the week everybody was a bit more nervous than usual. Nonetheless, this book gives a great insight into the various transfers and dealings. I loved the story of David Dein's daughter crying silently into her dinner when she realised her favourite Ian Wright was being sold. I did the same when I heard the news. The pictures include a picture of a banner-trailing plane – but unfortunately not the one I helped crowdfund. THE MOST COMPREHENSIVE BIOGRAPHY OF ARSENE WENGER EVER PUBLISHED, NOW FULLY REVISED AND UPDATED TO THE END OF HIS ARSENAL CAREER. I found myself invited to David Dein’s house that evening. He had said to me: ‘We’ll talk about football.’ I mainly recall a very sociable evening with a lot of laughter and games, a kind of charades. I seem to recall one of the subjects they asked me to enact was A Midsummer Night’s Dream – no easy task – and I got through it pretty well!” He says. “The friendship, complicity and understanding between David and me date from that first dinner, and from all the times we’ve seen each other since.”

From the outset, we embark on a near 70-year retrospective where life is totally interwoven with the sport. He takes as the starting point the family-run restaurant in Alsace where Wenger was first exposed to football, courtesy of the weekly gatherings of the local village team, culminating with the intensity of his time in North London where his sphere of influence ultimately permeated every aspect of Arsenal’s daily activity. I was at the training ground to interview Wenger the afternoon before the last game of the Invincibles season, and while I was waiting for him in his office, a Frenchman I didn’t recognise came in and slammed his hand down hard on the manager’s desk. “Stupid English regulations,” he said. I expressed sympathy. “We are trying to sign a player, an incredible player. Yaya Touré. He has much more power than his brother. But they won’t let us.” It was a story that provided me with great currency among fellow fans, especially a few years later, when Touré was tearing up the midfields and defences of every other Premier League team. It is the absence of revealing stories here that will most disappoint Wenger’s many admirers. When asked at a press conference, shortly before he left Arsenal, whether he was writing a book, he replied: “Not at the moment. Because I don’t like to talk and not tell the truth. As long as you are in work, you cannot really tell what is going on.” One should point out that he is still in work, at Fifa, perhaps the most political of all sporting bodies. What we have instead is a lot of quiet, thoughtful musings on the qualities necessary for management, coaching and playing, with lots of abstract nouns: “The action [today’s manager] needs to take should be based on a three-pronged approach: giving people responsibilities, personalising and openness, through clear and constant communication, based on today’s science.” Roy Keane probably wouldn’t have written that sentence. Instead of detailing his feelings as he goes into key matches he brushes aside huge events in a couple of sentences. Pretty much: “That year we won the double and the following year united won the treble.” Wow, ok thanks for the insight Arsene!Towards the end of My Life In Red And White, former Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger ponders the conversation that will take place should he eventually reach the gates of heaven. What to say? That this book left me underwhelmed is an understatement. I don't think anyone going to read this ever thought Wenger would lift the lid and dish out some nastiness or air vendettas against people, but what I expected was more emotion. More honesty. I was there for all the events he described. I know what happened. But I didn't need that. I wanted to know how he felt after the big decisions, the big games. Especially where he felt there were injustices. By being transparent. Fifa has to be completely open, their accounts have to be open. Fifa is not owned by the people who lead Fifa, it’s owned by the people who love football. I believe that Fifa needs an education mission and I’m the head of that and we want to reach people all over the world. At the moment, football is well organised in Europe but not in the rest of the world. Everybody in the world deserves a chance in the game and we have to be guided by that at Fifa. Change the plan you will roll onto at any time during your trial by visiting the “Settings & Account” section. What happens at the end of my trial? I had the opportunity to get to know you at U efa and F ifa meetings and dinners. With your culture and vision, I believe you have the qualities to be a top exec, such as a CEO or director of football, at a club. Would you have ever considered such a role at Arsenal or was your desire always to remain on the pitch?

Such lego sentences. And beyond that, what did you like about Viera? How did he make you feel? How did he feel? Tell us! Or better yet share anecdotes to show us. How did he fit into your philosohy? What surprised you about him? What did you learn from him? Coaxing that level of introspection and detail would've made for a better read. The book just fails to come to life – I was at many of the games featured in the book but almost never did I feel that the book was adding anything to spark my memories of the matches. And many iconic moments are simply not mentioned at all.You received a lot of criticism over your career, more so towards the end of your time with Arsenal. Was there any that particularly affected you? But what really twines the book together is a showcase of just how far dedication, obsession and loyalty can take someone. By any measure, Wenger is obsessive, and has often been excessively so. His passion for the sport in general has never wavered, and his vision is as clear now as it has ever been; something that strikes a power chord in the final chapter, where he outlines his plans at FIFA to increase development of the rules, young players and contribute to the growth of women's football too.