Football: Arsenal - Chapter 11: Tonight, North London's Arsenal Supporters Went Wild (Patreon)

Inside Emirates Stadium, the reaction was quite the opposite of the chaos in the commentary booths.

The entire crowd seemed trapped in a wonderful dream. The result was so incredible that nobody dared be the first to make a sound, afraid they might wake up and find it wasn't real.

As soon as the goal was confirmed, Kieran pointed straight at Ramsey to make it clear who deserved credit for setting it up. Then he sprinted for the touchline.

He had held in his excitement for so long. Finally, he could celebrate with everything he had!

But hang on. Why weren't the supporters reacting?

Reaching the edge of the pitch, Kieran saw Arsenal fans sitting absolutely motionless in the stands. He closed his eyes, folded his hands together, and rested his cheek against them as if he had fallen asleep.

It was a playful question to the crowd. Had all the Arsenal supporters nodded off?

The stadium lights fell across his face. In that instant, the supporters would have sworn they were looking at an angel bathed in holy light.

Then, as if jolted awake, the Gunners erupted.

“Kieran! Kieran!”

“King! King! King!”

“Oh my God! It actually went in! Five-four! What kind of miracle is this? We've really taken the lead!”

“Arsenal have won!”

“Arsenal are the champions! We are the champions!”

Kieran's cheeky sleeping gesture drove them even wilder. Here was a boy brought up in Arsenal's own academy, and one appearance had been enough for the supporters to crown him king.

They had never felt closer to a player. Somehow, the distance between the stands and the pitch seemed to have disappeared.

They forgot the small detail that the match wasn't finished yet. As far as their roaring voices were concerned, the result was already settled.

Faced with that immense wall of sound, Kieran could no longer keep up the joke. He opened his eyes and spread his arms wide.

Everywhere he looked, supporters were on their feet, fists raised, shouting his name. He broke into the brightest smile, one so infectious that everyone who saw it found themselves smiling too.

The cheering swelled louder still.

“Kieran! Kieran!”

Then the substitutes came racing onto the pitch, while Kieran's teammates converged on him from every direction.

Ramsey was the first to reach him. With a running leap, he landed on Kieran's back.

“Kieran! You're incredible! I knew you'd score that one! Thank you!” he shouted.

In his heart, Ramsey had already said those last two words countless times.

He was grateful that Kieran's first four goals had hauled the team out of despair and carried them all the way to the brink of an impossible victory.

But more than that, he was grateful for the way Kieran played without fear. At one particular moment, watching the youngster sprint so freely across the pitch had dispelled the fear that had haunted Ramsey for years.

In Kieran's freedom and refusal to surrender, Ramsey had found the reason he himself had wanted to play football in the first place.

He had wanted to pour all his youth and passion into the game, to build the finest career he could and never disappoint himself or the people who loved and believed in him.

He was still young. He had lost his way for a while, but at last, he had found it again.

“Kieran! My brother! Thank you! Seriously, thank you!” Ramsey kept shouting.

The noise inside the stadium was so deafening that Kieran couldn't understand a word. He grinned anyway and caught Ramsey, already planning to carry the man who had assisted his goal on a victory lap around the pitch.

They had barely taken a few steps when the rest of the team crashed into them from behind and sent both sprawling.

Cazorla, Giroud, Podolski, Koscielny, and everyone else piled in. Even the normally composed captain, Arteta, threw himself into the celebration.

Unfortunately, Kieran wound up right at the bottom of the heap. He was about to be flattened into a pancake!

“Help!”

“Kieran! You're unbelievable! Absolutely unbelievable!”

“Five goals! Five-four! We've come from behind against Juventus!”

Kieran struggled against the mass of bodies pressing down on him, with no success. It took every ounce of strength he had just to sit upright.

And the others still weren't finished. They pulled at his hair, wrapped arms around his waist and shoulders, and even squeezed his neck.

Some of these rough, overexcited men started kissing his cheeks and neck. Damn this European enthusiasm! At this rate, his teammates were going to suffocate him with affection.

A few seconds later, he caught sight of Wenger forcing his way through the crowd, looking positively ecstatic.

The manager planted several enthusiastic kisses on Kieran's face and pulled him into a huge embrace. The other players could scarcely remember ever seeing the French Professor so emotional.

Wenger was usually exceptionally restrained beside the pitch. Every now and then he offered a fatherly hug or a light kiss in the tunnel or dressing room, but even that was rare.

Nobody had time to marvel at his behavior now, though. They were all celebrating even more wildly than he was.

From the stands, Arsenal supporters had watched Kieran smile at them one moment, only for him to vanish beneath a pile of teammates the next.

That didn't stop them cheering. They didn't need to see him to show how much they loved him.

“Kieran! Kieran! Kieran!”

“King! King! King! King!”

In a single match, and in only thirteen minutes, Kieran had gone from Arsenal's Crown Prince to the King of Arsenal. It said everything about the impact of those thirteen extraordinary minutes.

Five goals by one player in so little time, capped by a match-winning comeback, was unprecedented enough. But the lift it gave everyone connected with Arsenal, players and supporters alike, was beyond measure.

Seven consecutive seasons had passed without a trophy. For the Gunners, those seven years had been a nightmare.

Their faithful supporters could endure poor results if the football remained beautiful. They loved the way Arsenal played, even when they hated the results.

The problem was that the most dazzling players kept disappearing. Some were sold to help pay off the debts from building the new stadium. Others decided to leave on their own.

Fàbregas, the young captain who had also made his Arsenal debut at sixteen, had even been willing to put up some of his own money to secure a transfer to Barcelona. The departure broke the fans' hearts.

Then came Van Persie. After repeatedly declaring, “If there's one person still loyal to Arsenal, it's me,” he inherited the captain's armband, only to leave for Manchester United the following season.

This season, deprived of one key player after another, Arsenal had struggled from one disappointment to the next.

By this point in 2012-13, they were already out of every domestic cup. In the Premier League they sat only fifth, behind even their bitter North London rivals, Tottenham.

The league title was beyond reach. Unless Arsenal fought their way into the top four, they would not even qualify for next season's Champions League.

It was one of the club's darkest hours. The supporters were desperate for someone to save them.

And then Kieran appeared, exceeding their wildest hopes and taking command of a Champions League match in a way nobody could have imagined.

All at once, the worries fell away.

Ha! What departed star players? What terrible results?

Even if they ended another season without a trophy, they could stop thinking about that for now. Nothing else seemed important.

What could possibly be more thrilling than having a truly extraordinary sixteen-year-old talent who belonged to Arsenal?

He was hope for at least the next decade of the club's future!

The supporters had stood by Arsenal through its worst years. Now that they could glimpse such a brilliant future, excitement alone was far too small a word for what they felt.

Their minds filled with dreams of everything still to come.

Inside the stadium, security kept supporters from rushing onto the pitch to embrace their king. Outside the ground, however, there were far fewer restrictions.

Fans poured through North London as though celebrating a title, waving flags and club crests as they marched through the streets. Their songs rose from every direction, drawing the attention of the whole city.

Some of the less restrained supporters even surged toward the Emirates entrances like a horde of zombies, repeatedly trying to force their way inside.

They wanted to cheer, to celebrate, and to embrace their heroes!