Arsenal officially confirmed winning the Premier League title on Tuesday night, but which players will get a winner’s medal at the end of the season?
Manchester City’s draw with AFC Bournemouth on Tuesday guaranteed that Arsenal will be this season’s Premier League winner, with the Gunners sitting four points clear of City with just one game left to play.
It’s now guaranteed that Arsenal club captain Martin Odegaard will lift the Premier League trophy at Selhurst Park this weekend, ending a 22-year wait to do so.
The question now is which players and staff will receive a winner’s medal after the game.
The Premier League award 40 medals to the title-winning club each year, which can be distributed to the manager, players, and staff as the club in question see fit.
The league will only grant additional medals if more than 39 players make five or more appearances in the given campaign. That doesn’t apply to Arsenal, so the Gunners will just get the base 40.
Of those 40, medals must go to any player who has made at least five Premier League appearances during the season. In Arsenal’s case, that applies to 24 players:
David Raya, Martin Zubimendi, Declan Rice, Viktor Gyokeres, Eberechi Eze, Leandro Trossard, Bukayo Saka, Gabriel Magalhaes, William Saliba, Jurrien Timber, Gabriel Martinelli, Noni Madueke, Riccardo Calafiori, Piero Hincapie, Martin Odegaard, Mikel Merino, Myles Lewis-Skelly, Cristhian Mosquera, Gabriel Jesus, Ben White, Kai Havertz, Christian Norgaard, Ethan Nwaneri, and Max Dowman.
Despite spending the second half of the season on loan with Marseille, Nwaneri played six times in the league in the first half of the campaign, so he qualifies. Dowman was on the borderline, with five appearances so far, but he makes it in too.
It is extremely likely that two of the remaining 16 medals will go to Kepa Arrizabalaga and Tommy Setford.
Though neither are guaranteed a medal by the rules, the two goalkeepers have been part of the senior travelling squad on a weekly basis. It would be very unfair not to reward their efforts considering they never had a chance to displace Raya from the starting lineup.
A medal will surely go to Mikel Arteta, and more to his assistants. Albert Stuivenberg (assistant), Gabriel Heinze (assistant), Miguel Molina (assistant), Nicolas Jover (set-piece coach), and Inaki Cana (goalkeeper coach) seem like good bets.
It Kepa, Setford, Arteta, and his foremost assistants all get medals, that would leave another eight to distribute.
As for those remaining medals, it’s anyone’s guess. Youth players Marli Salmon and Andre Harriman-Annous might have a chance, as both made multiple Premier League squads without actually coming on.
Other youth players have travelled to games as backups or third-choice goalkeepers without being named, and could be among those to receive a medal as well.
Jakub Kiwior seems like a long shot for a medal, but he’s the only other player to feature in the squad for a game. It’s perhaps more likely the remainder will go to the other staff, like the medical team, fitness coaches, assistant goalkeeper coaches, and so on.
The good news is that there will be no shortage of medals for the players who were involved on the pitch, nor the staff in the dugout each week.
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