I have a few memory flashes, especially of when I was in the hospital, but for me it wasn't dramatic - it was my parents who felt that,' he says. 'There was no possibility of not having the surgery, so they had to take the risk. But I was in good hands. I've spoken to my parents about it a lot, especially since I've had kids, because whenever my kids have something [wrong with them] I worry a lot. It always feels like the biggest thing in the world.'

Things got worse for Arteta's men in the 85th minute, and it was a moment Aaron Ramsdasle won't want to see again. The English goalkeeper played the ball out to Trossard, but the ball was immediately intercepted by Alexis Mac Allister. His deflection fell to Deniz Undav, who lifted the ball over a nervy Ramsdale. Meanwhile, there is growing concern for the whereabouts of Piers Morgan following last night’s result at the Etihad. And then there is the third, more modern crowd. The aesthetic progeny of José Mourinho, they are unashamedly stylish, all too aware they work in a glamorous job with unfettered access to designer clothing, and take as much care of themselves as the players do (they are usually recently retired players themselves). Arsenal boss Mikel Arteta insisted that his side concentrated on themselves and focussed on beating the Seagulls. However, they seemed to lose focus against Roberto De Zerbi's high-flying outfit. No manager likes noisy - he presumably means garish, rather than audible - clothes, but Arteta is especially averse. You're more likely to catch him in a Tottenham Hotspur shirt than anything gesturing towards pastel.

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Arsenal fans are bringing the ‘Arteta Out’ banners out of mothballs following last night’s 4-1 mauling at the hands of title rivals Manchester City. I say that, but they have just lost in the FA Cup to Manchester City when we meet. A few days later they will lose away to Everton. I may have jinxed it. Arteta can, at least, now change his clothes. It was a lovely moment for Arteta’s secondary signing of the summer window. Havertz was on the pitch for only 14 minutes but had perhaps his most composed game for Arsenal so far. This is a footballer who will always carry with him the air of a slightly limp and disappointed Jane Austen minor character, but on his better days does so with an air of upright authority. I just wear something that belongs to my personality, as well as the club that I represent,' Arteta says, of the decision he reached. Arteta himself was offered the academy director job after he retired from playing in 2016, but he didn’t know anything about running an academy. What he had learned from playing under Wenger, and before that seeing the “blind faith” that his former manager Luis Fernández had in him at Paris Saint-Germain, was that behind the best players were managers who made them believe greatness is possible.

Arteta's father, Miguel, ran marketing and technology projects for one of the largest banks in northern Spain; his mother, Charo, worked at a university, and never stopped worrying that something bad would happen when she watched her son playing sport. Arteta met Pep Guardiola at La Masia when he was a teenager and Guardiola, who is 10 years older than him, was playing in the first team. “He really looked after me from the beginning and from that day I got really attached to him,” Arteta says. After Arteta retired from professional football in 2016, Guardiola hired him as a coach at Manchester City, seeing in him, Arteta thinks, “someone who was willing to give his life for him.” Eating occasional sweet things is the only vice he can muster, and even that is offset by regular tennis, padel or walking the family's Dutch shepherd dog, Arnie. He likes travelling and clothes, but wouldn't say he spends all his money on them. Nor cars or property.This is a bulging pen. Within it are Guardiola, Zinedine Zidane, Frank Lampard, Mauricio Pochettino, to some extent Gareth Southgate (albeit with an M&S slant) and, without question, Mikel Arteta.

I tell him José Mourinho used to give short shrift to young players who had achieved little on the pitch but turned up at training with ever pricier cars. How would Arteta approach that? 'I'd probably try to understand why. I don't like judging them, I like understanding them.' A former player returning to the club and Arsenal winning their first title in 20 years was an irresistible fairy tale. That Arteta would have been triumphing over his former mentor and boss, Pep Guardiola, made it even more so. But by the Southampton game the headlines had turned; the swell of hope deflating long before winning was mathematically impossible. By the end of April, when Arsenal faced Manchester City in a game that had been billed as the title decider, City’s triumph felt like a clinical formality for the defending champions. In football, negativity is contagious. Arteta concedes this may have played a part, “but too much positivity can be very damaging as well.” Arsenal’s slump means the title is no longer in their hands and fans of the North London club have decided it’s time to bring their Arteta Out banners out of storage. When Arteta talks about the coming season, he says he wants to see the team determined to be the best, but that is as specific as he gets. He is softer and warmer than managerial sharks like José Mourinho; Arteta believes that helping players enjoy their job is how you get results. It’s by rebuilding Arsenal’s spirit, as much as via any tactical changes on the pitch, that he has the team and the fans feeling optimistic again. He sees the players growing every day, on the pitch beside the olive tree, its branches steadily stretching toward the sky. “I love winning,” he says, “but we have to deserve to win.”It’s a bit like the United fans with their green and yellow scarves. When things are going well on the pitch, they’re nowhere to be seen’. He was born with a heart defect that needed immediate attention but couldn't be resolved until he was two, when he underwent what was, at the time, one of the first open heart surgeries of its kind in Spain. He still has a large scar running north to south along his sternum. She helped me because nothing was ever a problem. The weather was never a problem, the life was never a problem, an injury was never a problem, it was just an opportunity to do something else. Like, "OK, we're going to spend more time together, you and I, in the house." She has opened my mind. I'm from San Sebastián, my mind was sometimes very, very straight. She's taught me to find the solution, not focus on the problem.'