If Arteta is keeping dossiers on other managers, he’s playing dangerous game for Arsenal
English football loves the word “dossier”. It doesn’t love dossiers themselves, of course; they’re for nerds – unless, that is, they’re a “secret dossier”, which have a thrilling redolence of spy dramas, invisible ink and dead drops.
Non-secret dossiers, though, are inherently risible: call something a “dossier” in English football and you’re immediately signalling: this is absurd poindextering. Dossiers were preposterous when Don Revie was – imagine the pretension! – drawing up scouting reports on opposing players, and they are preposterous today as Mikel Arteta collates images of rival managers stepping outside their technical area.
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