What can Arsenal teach Keir Starmer about politics? You need a clear vision, a tight grip – and hope | Jonathan Freedland

The sensational title win didn’t happen by accident, it took years of dedication and planning, something the PM should note

Obviously, I know that politics and football are different. One is a high-stakes endeavour that affects the lives of hundreds of millions of people, with an impact felt around the globe and down the generations – and the other is politics. I know too that there will be plenty of readers who will be like I was until nearly a couple of decades ago: cheerfully indifferent to the beautiful game, even after a week like this one, when the top prize in English football was won. But stick with me, because there are lessons to be learned from what just happened – lessons for politics, for the prime minister and for all of us.

I am referring, of course, to Arsenal winning the Premier League, ending a 22-year long wait that it sometimes seemed would never end. I claim no objectivity here. I became a fan just a few years into that drought, brought into the Arsenal fraternity by my young sons. So there I was, in the crowd that instantly converged on the Emirates Stadium late on Tuesday night, Arsenal shirt and scarf on, singing loudly and beaming at strangers.

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