Same old Arsenal always cheating

 

 

“SAME OLD ARSENAL…..”

by Billy Bunter

The chant, the history and the reputation Arsenal cannot seem to escape.

There are plenty of football chants that belong unmistakably to a particular club or rivalry, but few have become as closely associated with Arsenal as “Same old Arsenal, always cheating.” It can appear at almost any Premier League ground when Arsenal are the visitors, usually after a disputed challenge, a penalty appeal, a player going to ground or simply an incident that has annoyed the home supporters.

But where did it come from?

The frustrating answer is that nobody seems to know for certain. No reliable evidence identifies who invented it, which match first featured it, or which Arsenal incident started it. Supporters were certainly familiar with it many years ago, and some recall similar wording being aimed at other clubs before Arsenal became its main target.

That possibility is important. Football supporters have always been inventive when it comes to insulting the opposition, and a phrase such as “Same old xxxx, always cheating” is simple enough to adapt to whichever team irritates the crowd. At some point, Arsenal earned a reputation strong enough for the words to become almost permanently attached to them. That is why the chant stuck: it reflects a reputation that grew, rather than a single defining moment.

A reputation built over time

The answer probably has less to do with one incident than with Arsenal’s reputation over several decades.

During the Arsène Wenger era, Arsenal became one of the most technically accomplished and successful sides in English football. Wenger changed how Arsenal played and transformed his squads, bringing in players from across Europe and beyond as English football was still adjusting to different attitudes towards physical contact, winning free-kicks and simulation.

Some Arsenal players were also extremely difficult to play against. Patrick Vieira was a magnificent footballer, but he was hardly a calming influence on a match. Ashley Cole, Lauren and others developed reputations that made them unpopular with opposition supporters, while Wenger himself was frequently involved in arguments with referees and opposing managers.

None of that proves Arsenal were cheating, of course. It does, however, show how a footballing reputation develops: when opponents already dislike a successful team, they remember every contentious incident, while ordinary incidents are forgotten. Eventually, the reputation becomes more powerful than any individual incident.

Pires and the penalty that became folklore

Robert Pires’ penalty against Portsmouth in 2003 remains one of the most famous examples associated with Arsenal’s supposed willingness to make the most of contact.

Pires went down under a challenge from Arjan de Zeeuw and Arsenal were awarded a penalty. However, the incident drew widespread criticism because many people believed the contact did not justify the reaction. Pires later acknowledged that he had attempted to win the penalty.

The incident therefore became perfect ammunition for Arsenal’s critics, particularly because it fitted so neatly into the emerging narrative.

Eduardo’s penalty against Celtic several years later produced another controversy. UEFA investigated the incident before deciding not to pursue disciplinary action, but by then the damage to Arsenal’s reputation had already been done. To some supporters, it looked like another example of an Arsenal player making the most of a challenge inside the penalty area.

Yet neither incident suggests Arsenal, as a club, was uniquely dishonest. They show something rather different: once a reputation has been established, every new controversy tends to reinforce it.

The Kanu incident was something different

There was also an earlier Arsenal controversy that had nothing to do with diving, but which is particularly relevant to the idea of “cheating”.

In 1999, Arsenal became involved in one of the most memorable examples of football’s unwritten rules. In an FA Cup fifth-round match against Sheffield United, the visitors put the ball out so an injured player could receive treatment. Ray Parlour attempted to return possession, but Arsenal debutant Nwankwo Kanu intercepted the throw without apparently realising what Parlour intended and continued the attack, eventually crossing for Marc Overmars to score. Arsenal had not broken any written Law of the Game, but the goal clearly violated the accepted spirit of fair play. Arsène Wenger immediately recognised the problem, Arsenal offered Sheffield United a replay and the FA approved it. Arsenal won the replay 2–1 as well. This distinction matters because football supporters have never judged behaviour solely by the official rulebook. There is also an unwritten code concerning what is considered sporting, fair and acceptable.

A player can therefore be technically within the rules while still being accused of cheating by thousands of supporters who believe he has taken advantage of something that should have been respected.

That is one of football’s peculiarities.

Arsenal were hardly alone

There is also a rather obvious problem with singling out Arsenal.

Diving and gamesmanship have never belonged exclusively to North London. Manchester United, for example, had Ashley Young, whose reputation for going to ground easily became so pronounced that even Sir Alex Ferguson publicly acknowledged the issue after controversial penalty incidents involving him.

Gareth Bale also faced accusations of simulation during his Tottenham career.

The point is not to label either player a cheat. It is to recognise that professional football has always contained players willing to make the most of contact, appeal strongly for decisions and test the limits of what a referee will allow.

Arsenal did not invent gamesmanship. They simply ended up with perhaps the most memorable chant attached to it, because the club’s reputation made the words easy to repeat and hard to shake.

Success makes the reputation stronger

Another reason the accusation became so persistent is that Arsenal were successful.

A struggling team can get away with a great deal because nobody cares very much about them. A successful team is different. Every controversial decision attracts attention, particularly when it appears to help a side competing for trophies.

Arsenal win a penalty, and somebody remembers Pires. An Arsenal player goes down, and somebody remembers Eduardo. An opponent is sent off, and supporters begin wondering whether Arsenal influenced the referee.

The next incident then becomes part of the same story.

Eventually, supporters no longer need to remember precisely what happened in the original incidents. The reputation itself becomes enough to sustain the chant. That is how football folklore works. And it gets rather tiring.

There is something about the words

There may even be a simple reason why this particular chant has survived.

“Same old Arsenal, always cheating” has a ring to it

The rhythm is natural, the words are easy to remember, and the repeated vowel sound gives it a satisfying flow when thousands of supporters sing it together….

“Same old United, always cheating.”

… does not quite work in the same way. The rhythm feels less natural, and the words do not have quite the same punch.

That may seem like a small point, but football chants survive partly because they sound right. A good chant does not need explaining; it simply rolls around a stadium and becomes part of the experience.

Unfortunately for Arsenal, their name fits this one rather perfectly.

From Tottenham to everybody else

The chant has an obvious connection with Tottenham because the North London derby provides the perfect environment for it, but it has long since escaped that particular rivalry.

Supporters of other clubs have adopted it, and it has become a general-purpose Arsenal taunt rather than something that belongs exclusively to Spurs.

That evolution is significant.

Supporters singing it do not necessarily need to believe an Arsenal player has actually cheated. The words have become shorthand for a particular perception of the club, and that perception has been passed from one generation of supporters to another.

Many people singing the chant today probably could not identify the incidents that helped create the reputation in the first place.

They simply know the words.

Arteta’s Arsenal has given it a modern setting

Mikel Arteta’s Arsenal has also provided opposition supporters with plenty of opportunities to revive the old chant.

Arteta’s teams are highly organised and extremely competitive, and they are very conscious of the small details that can influence a match. Arsenal players appeal for decisions, attempt to control the tempo, put pressure on referees and are perfectly willing to make a game uncomfortable for their opponents.

Opposing supporters have complained about time-wasting, players surrounding referees, physical challenges and Arsenal’s reaction to contentious decisions.

But there is an important qualification.

Arsenal is not unique.

Every serious professional team attempts to manage matches, slow the game when protecting a lead, influence referees and exploit whatever small advantages the rules allow. What makes Arsenal different is that they already carry the reputation, so behaviour that might be dismissed as normal gamesmanship when another team does it can immediately be interpreted as confirmation when Arsenal are involved.

The old chant therefore remains ready to go.

The chant has become almost self-parodying

There is now something slightly amusing about the way it is used.

An Arsenal player can be fouled, and the opposition supporters sing it. An Arsenal player can commit the foul, and they sing it again. An Arsenal player can go down injured, appeal for a handball, or simply become involved in a disputed decision, and the same words can suddenly come from the stands.

At that point, it has moved beyond a serious accusation and become part of the (exclusively boring) theatre of football.

That is probably why the chant has survived so well. Nobody really needs to prove anything. The crowd isn’t presenting evidence to a referee or making a formal allegation; it is simply telling Arsenal supporters that their team has annoyed them.

And, in football, that can be regarded as a compliment.

And then came the 2026 Community Shield

The chant is not confined to old rivalries, either. At the 2026 Community Shield, Manchester City supporters were already singing “Same old Arsenal, always cheating” early in the match, following an incident involving an Arsenal player being fouled and the referee making the correct decision. The timing was almost comic, especially since Arsenal looked far better and eventually ran out 3–0 winners.

It is so ironic to hear City supporters singing about cheating. Manchester City are still awaiting the outcome of the Premier League’s case involving 115 (alleged) breaches of its financial regulations, all of which the club denies. That does not make City guilty of anything; the case remains unresolved, and the allegations still have to be determined. Nevertheless, the number has become such a familiar part of the football landscape that it was difficult not to notice the contrast.

Arsenal, meanwhile, were doing their talking on the pitch. They were comfortably the better team, won the Community Shield and left City supporters singing about Arsenal’s supposed dishonesty. That may be the modern version of the chant in its purest form

Arsenal may have turned the insult around

The chant’s evolution has a delicious irony.

It was created, or at least adopted, as an insult. Yet some Arsenal supporters now regard it as evidence that their team is getting under the opposition’s skin.

If thousands of supporters are singing about Arsenal, then Arsenal are clearly living in their heads. If the home crowd is becoming increasingly frustrated with how Arsenal is playing, appealing, defending, or managing the match, perhaps Arsenal are doing something rather effectively.

The chant has therefore acquired an unintended second meaning.

It may still be intended as an accusation, but Arsenal supporters hear it as confirmation that their team is causing problems.

So, is Arsenal really different?

Probably not.

Arsenal has had players who exaggerated contact, attempted to win penalties and tested the limits of what referees would tolerate. So have every other club in English football.

The difference is that Arsenal acquired a phrase that has proved remarkably durable.

Pires provided ammunition. Eduardo added another chapter. The Kanu incident demonstrated that accusations of “cheating” can involve the spirit of the game as well as its written laws. The combative Wenger years strengthened the reputation, while the modern Arteta side has given opposition supporters a new collection of incidents around which they can revive the old joke.

But the chant has now outlived the incidents that helped create it.

It has become part of Arsenal’s football folklore, passed down from one generation of supporters to the next, and heard far beyond the North London derby.

Perhaps that is why its precise origin matters less than we might think. The original incident, if there ever was one, has been lost beneath decades of rivalry, controversy and Arsenal success.

What remains are the words.

“Same old Arsenal, always cheating.”

And perhaps Arsenal supporters have finally found the perfect response:

They called it cheating. Arsenal called it living rent-free in their heads.