As the open-top bus pulled into north London’s Seven Sisters Road and we got our first glimpse of a triumphant Declan Rice and Mikel Arteta, the crowd erupted with cheers and the air became thick with red flares. An elderly woman in an Arsenal hat on a deck chair, who, like us, had arrived three hours earlier to claim a front-row space on the parade route, blinked in disbelief as if struggling to take it all in. A Turkish man next to us who had set up camp with his three daughters (one in a pram) all dressed in Arsenal kits screamed: “We love you Arteta.” Then the crowd broke into the club’s anthem, North London Forever. I’m not one to get emotional over sport, but it was a moment I’ll never forget.
It was possibly one of the best days I’ve had out in the capital — ever (and I’m London born and bred)
