Ten interesting Arsenal facts I’ve learned from Martin Keown’s autobiography | OneFootball

It’s that time of the year where naturally my friends and family buy me Arsenal related items. Recently I read Martin Keown’s autobiography and recommend this as a Christmas gift for any Gooners you know.

There are obvious stories about all the trophies he won and being selected for World Cups and European Championships but here I selected 10 lesser-known takeaways ….

Irish Roots

The test of a good autobiography is does the reader put the book down feeling like they had learnt anything new. That’s hard to do as the assumption would be that most who have invested their time and money are aware of the subject.

While I knew Keown was Irish I wasn’t aware of the discrimination he faced growing up in England. After the Birmingham bombings in 1974 were attributed to the Irish Republican Army, the Keown’s family business was vandalized, and an 8-year-old Martin recalls being verbally abused and told in no uncertain terms he didn’t belong in the country.

This shaped his personality. Instead of an arm round the shoulder his parents taught him to fight, defiantly insisting that he had as much right to live in the country as anyone.

FIFA rules were stricter back when he started his playing career but it’s clear Keown was open to representing either side of Ireland in the early nineties, but the criteria back then meant that once he featured for the England Under 21’s you couldn’t change your allegiance. You sense maybe Keown regrets this?

Leaving The First Time

Leaving Arsenal for the first time remains one of Keown’s biggest regrets. He regretted the decision that very preseason before he even played for his new club. The defender said if he had slept on his choice and not had been as impulsive, he would have stayed in North London, but Aston Villa happened to call that day. If he was street wise enough at the time he even would have contacted Arsenal to cancel the contract with Villa.

He was being offered 600 pounds a week at Villa Park compared to 350 at Highbury. To this day though Keown insists he wasn’t motivated by money, but it was strictly principal. He felt a pay rise of 50 pounds a week was his employer going against their word, while he was also offended that George Graham had him waiting hours for a meeting.

George Graham

George Graham’s managerial style was rightly celebrated, but you sense Martin Keown wasn’t always impressed with the culture at the club and reached a point where he felt his manager needed to adapt.

Having won trophies Keown felt the squad were getting complacent, hence their league positioning. The defender questioned why the team bus would take a detour of London to drop players off at their favorite night clubs or pick up the many players late for departure? He would ponder if good preparation for a game at Old Trafford was to not leave the coach till a game of cards had finished?

He senses Mr. Graham might not have appreciated the questioning.

‘Wenger changed my life.’

It’s a constant theme throughout this book how much respect Keown has for Mr. Wenger. I have felt over the years some Gooners have tried to downplay the unhealthy environment the Frenchman inherited.

A section of our fan base has tried to suggest that it was exaggerated how Mr. Wenger extended the careers of certain players with his methods. Well, listen to a player who witnessed life at Highbury before and during life under Arsene Wenger.

Yes, there was a dressing room who had been successful but clearly bad habits existed and Keown himself disagreed with the culture that had been created.

Alcohol days before a game was made taboo, especially after Tony Adams went public with his demons. It was preached that this was essentially poisoning your body. ‘Chew to win’ became a slogan, the squad educated that chewing your food means you save energy.

Each player would have their own vitamins exclusive to their action plan. Chefs were ordered to cook main meals at the training ground instead of everyone eating at home. Everyone was ordered to increase their water intake, and not only when they were thirsty.

The emphasis in practice was to keep the ball on the floor and take no more than two touches per pass. Work wouldn’t start without everyone in the squad shaking hands.

The defender said he never felt in better condition than when stretching after training was introduced. Admiration clearly goes beyond the sport though, with the player saying that he learnt life lessons from his boss.

Tommy Coleman

Because of the career he had, Keown can account his experience with his youth team coach with a shrug of the shoulders. Yet in 2024 I’m not sure if someone in that role would get away with this abuse of power? It remains a policy at Arsenal to house academy prospects with families they work with.

At the time with no live-in landlords available, Tommy Coleman offered the teenager a room at his house. Long term though the youngster felt uncomfortable working and living essentially with his boss – so moved out.

Mrs. Coleman was offended by this and therefore the defender was told by his coach ‘you made life murder for me, so I’m going to make life difficult for you’. Bear in mind Coleman held the centreback’s future in his hands, the man responsible for filing reports on the players and giving feedback on how loan moves were developing. Keown accuses Coleman of sabotaging his career by not providing accurate accounts of his performance and making him play through or rush back from injuries.

Bruce Rioch

Again, proving the magnitude of the drinking culture Mr. Wenger walked into, Keown feels that the main reason Bruce Rioch didn’t succeed at Highbury was that he was emotionally exhausted from being a counselor to so many players.

The defender feels that judged purely as a coach; the manager actually had some decent tactical ideas that were ahead of his time. The issue was the number of off-the-field issues that had to be dealt with.

The likes of Paul Merson and Tony Adams were struggling with various vices, and it was difficult trying to look after a squad, while individually putting arms round so many shoulders. This made Keown appreciate Mr. Wenger’s man management style even more.

Liverpool speech

Now he wants to stress he’s not trying to take total credit for our famous 4-2 win over Liverpool in 2004 and accepts his teammates might have won even without his output.

Yet Keown cites this as one of the few times he properly did a half time speech for his manager. At 37, the defender only just qualified for his title medal but felt he had massive responsibility off the pitch to reinforce the dressing room about the culture of the club.

In the same week Arsenal was knocked out of the FA Cup and Champions League, the Gunners found themselves 2-1 down at Highbury at half time.

Standard practice was for Mr. Wenger to say very little at the interval, instead trusting his players to find solutions. Keown felt a sense of his peers feeling sorry for themselves so asked his boss permission to speak from his boss. Henry was apparently offended by the accusation so went on to complete his hat trick in our comeback

Training Ground

I have already highlighted the changes that Mr. Wenger implemented but this one deserves its own entry. Most Gooners will be aware of the dietary and stretching methods the Frenchman introduced but might be less aware of the state of our training facilities.

Not just did Arsenal share facilities with the University but the students were prioritized, meaning the Gunners could not practice on a Wednesday. Our manager was rightly baffled that this had been allowed to happen at a professional football club, pointing out that Sir Alex Ferguson would never tolerate that arrangement in Manchester.

Keown suggests that his boss would not have extended his contract if this didn’t change. Famously Anelka would be sold, paying for a state-of-the-art training facility and a certain Thierry Henry

Return As a Coach

One of the biggest criticisms of Mr. Wenger was he took too long to trust his ex-players to return and help out the club. One of the first (and few) he invited to come back to take his coaching badges was Keown. The Invincible even has been credited for working with the back 4 that set a record for how long they went without conceding a goal on route to the Champions League Final.

He claims it was him who convinced Flamini he could do a job as a left back. Keown has hinted that some other staff including Pat Rice might have been threatened by his new ideas and that Mr. Wenger didn’t want to upset his coaching team. This included personally showing individuals videos of mistakes they were making. That’s when Keown was reminded how protective his former boss was of his players.

Tony Adams

Near the end of the book Keown includes a recent meeting he had with Tony Adams. Why the need for a transcript with his former captain? Because this exchange is the perfect summary of Keown’s personality.

While clearly willing to battle in his career and not afraid to challenge authority, there’s a sense the defender always played with a chip on his shoulder? Motivated by the desire to prove people wrong.

While discussing his autobiography with his ex-skipper, Keown finally gets validation off the man he perhaps respected more than anyone else in the dressing room. Given that the two had played together since the academy, it feels sad that Keown had to wait till the age of 58 to get validation.

Yet the two were constantly compared to each other and it’s clear at various times for both club and country, Keown feels he wasn’t always appreciated. No longer in competition with each other, Keown finally hears Tony Adams refers to him as a great centre back.

Martin Keown On the Edge is available now.

Dan Smith

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