Arsenal season preview, pick, predictions: Gunners reload and set

If there is a blueprint for how to follow a near-miss season, Arsenal followed it to the millimeter. Assertive in the transfer window and creative in their structuring of the squad, Mikel Arteta’s side seem primed to take the next step forward in 2023-24. Whether that is enough to take them close to the best team in the world is unknowable for the time being but you could not accuse this club of resting on their laurels.

Already Arsenal have emerged victorious from a few minor skirmishes with Manchester City, winning the Community Shield after a combative, technical display at Wembley in which they looked a match for the treble winners. Of more long-term significance might be the £105 million acquisition of Declan Rice, secured despite a late play by Pep Guardiola. That the England international found the lure of building something in north London to be more persuasive than the guarantee of major honors at the Etihad Stadium says everything about the salesmanship of Arteta.

A team that have spent a decade scrabbling in the discard bins at Real Madrid and Barcelona are now going toe to toe with Europe’s most prestigious names and getting the players they want. Bayern Munich in…