Even when the stakes could barely be higher, Bukayo Saka finds the capacity to step back a little and marvel. He needs no telling what Sunday’s north London derby means, the possibilities victory would unlock and the likely implications of falling short, but it would not feel the same without a sense of fun.
“When you go in the stadium and see the atmosphere, it’s beautiful,” he says of those afternoons when Arsenal and Spurs face off. “I try to enjoy it. There has to be an element of seriousness, discipline and focus, but you have to try to enjoy it as well.”
As if to prove the point, laughs come readily during a conversation with Saka. Protagonists in the title race are never minded to give too much away at this point in the season but he is chatty and relaxed, readily admitting that the other contenders’ games have been appointment viewing at home. He could not confidently punch the air when Everton scored on Wednesday night because Liverpool “can score any time, whether it’s the 90th minute or 90 plus 17”; all anyone could do the following evening was acknowledge Manchester City were “unbelievable … they destroyed Brighton”.
But Saka and Arsenal have been taking opponents apart too. Their rout of Chelsea soothed concerns that April may, for the second successive year, prove the cruellest month. One encounter with bitter rivals from the capital was sweet preparation for the biggest of all. Saka laid on the fourth goal for Kai Havertz: he was out there casting spells on the right flank because he always is. There can be few more durable footballers than Saka, who just keeps going in the weekly buffeting.
“The hunger to win keeps me going, that’s why I keep getting up,” he says, laughing again when it is suggested he possesses an extraordinarily high pain threshold. “I’m physically much stronger than I was four or five years ago. For each tackle I have more experience in terms of which ones to go for and which ones to jump, to try to avoid a big tackle. So I’m much smarter as well.”
It is mid-afternoon and Saka has come straight from a gym session. He and Martin Ødegaard are often to be seen going through routines after most of their teammates have departed and perhaps it is no surprise that Arsenal’s two genuinely world-class creative talents require extra conditioning. The wisdom of experience is helpful but it cannot always take you out of harm’s way.
Saka is a marked man, doubled up on by opponents and frequently dumped to the ground, but he has missed only two league games. “It’s the opposite of joy,” he says, grinning, when asked whether it is still possible to have that sense of enjoyment when a left-back puts in an early reducer.
He has developed coping strategies, though, and it is fascinating to hear the thought process. “There are two elements,” he says. “The first is that the defenders can’t do that all game. They’ll get yellow cards and then they have to stop.
“The second element is that as an attacking player you are in the team to score goals, create goals. Part of that is going to involve having to beat defender and, yeah, they’re going to try their best to stop you. But just because you get a kick, you can’t hide away and not do that. Because that’s what you are in the team to do.”
He has equalled last season’s tally of 14 Premier League goals. It is the best of a career that remains young even if some onlookers, including the former Arsenal goalkeeper Bob Wilson, have voiced concerns that it may be shortened if he is not given better protection by referees.
“I don’t try to put those negative thoughts in my head because then I’ll start to be more shy in the duels, and then it will affect my game,” he says.
Does it occur to him that, at certain times, a little exaggeration could catch the officials’ attention? Saka has little form for rolling around. “A lot of the time, if I stay on the floor for too long it breaks the momentum for the team,” he says. “So I just try to get on with it.”
Arteta has long told Saka that, to take the most from his talent, he must become physically and mentally bulletproof. Eyebrows were raised in the room when, 18 months ago, he remarked that the best players “play 70 matches, and every three days” and “there is not a fitness coach in the world who is going to tell me they cannot do it”.
Last season, Saka played 62 times, including internationals, and he could hit the 60 mark again this time around if England thrive at Euro 2024. The absence of quality cover for his position, and consequent lack of rotation, is one of the few obvious questions about Mikel Arteta’s squad but private conversations have mirrored the manager’s public proclamations.
“He told me the elite players all do it, so if I want to get to that level I have to be ready to play that many games, and try to help my team win each of those games as well,” Saka says. “It’s big numbers but it’s achievable. You see the best players in the world do it and I believe I can do it as well.”
Saka, whose ability to absorb information has never been in doubt, is doing it now but the urge to congratulate himself rarely surfaces. “I don’t look back and be proud of myself because I’m always wanting more and always wanting to do better,” he says. “Each game I always come off the pitch and think ‘could I have scored more, could I have done this better?’”
A match-winning performance against Tottenham, which would put Arsenal in the driving seat if City proceed to slip up at the City Ground, might constitute a new peak. Saka scored a penalty when they met at the Emirates in September; it was his second goal in this fixture and, more broadly he appears to relish local rivalries. Since the start of last season he has had 17 goals or assists in all-London games and he suspects it is no coincidence.
“In the London derbies there are a lot of teams that don’t play so much of a low block, so there’s more space for me,” he says. “That’s maybe why I have that record. But whether it’s a north London derby, a London derby or any other game in the Premier League, I approach the game with the same mentality: to try to attack.”
There is little danger of Spurs, under Ange Postecoglou, resting on their laurels so Saka may make hay once again if Arsenal find their rhythm. He knows Liverpool’s woes at Goodison Park offer a salutary lesson that these occasions, heady on the senses as they may be, can deliver far-reaching shocks.
“I try not to read too much into those games, but at the same time it shows that you have to be 100% focused on every game. Each team, or most of the teams, have something to play for. Each game is like a final for all of us competing for the title, especially Sunday.”
It would not quite rival winning the league at White Hart Lane in 2004, but the feeling crackles that this is the most important derby since then. “I know what it means to myself, to my family and friends, and to our fans, to beat Tottenham,” he says.
“On the weekend, it’s about more than beating Tottenham. There’s a Premier League title race that we are in, we know those points are so important to us.”
Fitness, sharpness and recovery could tweak the finest of margins. Arsenal are assured and rested before a day that could put glory within touching difference. Saka is not one for ice baths if he can help it: he prefers soothing those bruised, seemingly indefatigable, muscles in the sauna.
“That’s exactly where I’m going now,” he says with one last smile. It will soon be full steam ahead along Seven Sisters Road.
