The Monied Modern Rivalry Between Arsenal and Manchester City

The ball is cleared desperately out of the area, and Manchester City are back in possession. One pass later and a tussle on the right wing, and a Shaun Wright-Phillips cross is hurtling into the box. There, standing slap bang in the middle of two embarrassingly muddled defenders, is a 6"3 striker in sky blue kit, sporting wristbands in the national colours of Togo. He leaps, he thumps his header home, and he turns to sprint off in celebration. In the commentary box is John Motson, presumably wearing his famous sheepskin coat, screaming: "ADEBAYOOOOR!"

What happens next will go down in Premier League history, and earn Emmanuel Adebayor a place in the pantheon of football's immortals. He charges up the other end of the pitch, arms flapping wildly, roaring in maniacal fashion while flying past jubilant City supporters in the stands. Suddenly, it becomes apparent that something is wrong, and that this celebration is going to be preserved in infamy. Before anyone can stop him, Adebayor is on his knees, arms outstretched, wallowing in a cascade of bottles, rubbish and assorted debris being thrown from an incandescent Arsenal away end. Behind him is a bemused-looking Kolo Toure, hands held up as if to say: "Honestly, this has nothing to do with me."

While this might have been an iconic flashpoint, it was not in fact the start of the very modern rivalry between Arsenal and Manchester City. The tensions had begun in earnest several months before when, in July 2009, City signed both Toure and Adebayor from their financially laboured foes. Arsenal were feeling the bite of their investment in the Emirates, and the barren era of shoestring budgets and terrified teenage prodigies was well underway. Here they were, a bunch of 17-year-olds, expected to emulate the success of the Invincibles and being shouted at by thousands of fortysomething men for failing. Understandably, Denilson, Samuel Galindo, Fran Merida and dozens of others like them fell by the wayside in this fashion, before being farmed out on loan to the Spanish second division, or worse. The senior players around them hardly helped the situation, with chronic unreliables like Manuel Almunia, Emmanuel Eboue and William Gallas rounding off a seriously debilitated team, only partly redeemed by a handful of fleet-footed creatives in the mould of Cesc Fabregas, Tomas Rosicky and Abou Diaby, when he actually was fit to play.

Meanwhile, quite the opposite was going on at Manchester City, who were growing in confidence both as a team and as a financial behemoth off the pitch. City had been bought by the Abu Dhabi United Group the year before, and their new owners were determined to make a statement of fiscal intent. Having already bought Gareth Barry, Roque Santa Cruz and Carlos Tevez ahead of the 2009/10 season for a combined cost of £55.5m in transfer fees alone, they then forked out another £41m on Toure and Adebayor. While these figures would still be lavish in the modern day, they were absolutely gargantuan back then. City went on to buy Joleon Lescott for £22m later in the summer, bringing their total transfer outlay to an eye-watering £118.5m.

With the two clubs going in different directions financially, Arsenal fans were always going to resent their Mancunian counterparts. The North London side had been champions five years previously, but were now in the midst of a trophyless spell which, unbeknownst to them, would go on for another five excruciating years. In regards to City's extravagant spending, many Arsenal fans resorted to taking the moral high ground, arguing that theirs was the proper way to go about ensuring long-term success despite their intense and thinly veiled envy. Their club had used its own resources to finance a new, state-of-the-art stadium, looking to a self-sustainable future as opposed to relying on the largesse of an oligarch. This was certainly Arsene Wenger's position and – with his wisdom still largely unquestioned at this point – was a stance he used to defend his side's also-ran status, accusing City, like Chelsea before them, of "financial doping" in their approach.

Moralising in football tends to ring rather hollow, sadly, and in this case it only served to pique Man City fans at a time that was otherwise halcyon. The incipient rivalry between Arsenal and City was soon being characterised as a war of philosophies, finances and ideals, which was heightened by the fact that City had pursued Arsenal players directly that summer, and no doubt incentivised them heavily to sign. In the September immediately following his move, Arsenal fans travelled to the City of Manchester Stadium and roundly booed Adebayor, whom the majority saw as motivated by money in his decision to depart North London. Soon enough, he was celebrating on his knees in front of them. Adebayor had clearly bought into the hype of the new rivalry; afterwards, he was handed a three-match ban for violent conduct, having been found guilty of deliberately stamping on Robin van Persie's face.

The enmity between the two clubs only got worse in the years to come, with City completing a double swoop for Gael Clichy and Samir Nasri in the summer of 2011. Despite costing a cool £10m, the Clichy transfer went under the radar somewhat owing to the fierce acrimony of Nasri's move. Having arrived at Arsenal as a budding youngster and flourished under Wenger's tutelage, Nasri was perceived to have forced through a transfer at a vulnerable time for the North London club. Cesc Fabregas had only just been poached by Barcelona, and the subsequent loss of Nasri tore the creative heart out of the team. Four days after Nasri's move and two weeks after the departure of Fabregas, an abject, pathetic Arsenal side travelled to Old Trafford and conceded eight goals in an orgy of self-destruction. It was the club's lowest point in the 21st century, and a humiliation the fans will never forget.

There was certainly some transference of blame for this on to Arsenal's Mancunian émigrés, with criticism of Nasri and co. soon loaded with emotive concepts like loyalty, trustworthiness and respect. Though it may seem fantastically naive in hindsight, many fans expected the players to show appreciation to the club that had invested in them, and given their youthful talents a platform from which they had launched their senior careers. Football doesn't work that way, unfortunately, and the call of the Manchester City project was too strong to resist for some. That said, there was another angle to the Nasri transfer which threatened Arsenal on an existential level.

As with Fabregas, Nasri was part of Arsene Wenger's long-term vision for the future. In lieu of massive transfer funds, Wenger had been building a team of youngsters who were meant to mature into the team of the century. One by one, the best of these players were being snapped up by clubs with more money, though usually after several years of service to Arsenal at least. The Nasri transfer seemed like a watershed moment, in that he was only just starting to realise his potential in North London. The fact that he was pried away so swiftly made Arsenal seem like little more than a conveyor belt for talent and, not so long after their Invincibles season, a club which had been transformed from radical champions to a convenient supplier of players for their foes.

For anyone who has been at a game where Nasri has returned to face Arsenal, the strength of feeling over his transfer should be abundantly clear. Much like Adebayor before him, he became a pantomime villain at the Emirates, a superpowered boo magnet who drew howls of rage wherever he went. Meanwhile, having harvested some of their rivals' most promising players, Manchester City began to outdo Arsenal, soon winning the league in spectacular fashion and relegating their North London counterparts to a semi-perpetual third or fourth place. By now, the bitter feud between the two clubs had all the necessary ingredients. There had been memorable matches, transfer wrangles, fundamental differences of philosophy and a good deal of moral and financial posturing for good measure. Throw in the most coveted of domestic trophies, the decline of one club and the rise of another, and the Premier League looked to have birthed a mutual loathing that made little geographical or historical sense.

In the present, the picture appears much altered when it comes to the rivalry between Arsenal and City. While there is still a residual resentment between the two clubs, the fires of the fans' antipathy have died down and smoldered away. It helps that City haven't pursued an Arsenal player in overt fashion in recent times – putting aside the signing of Bacary Sagna – but the lessened financial constraints in North London have made moralising over expenditure seem vaguely absurd. A combination of dwindling stadium debt and ever-increasing television money have levelled the playing field somewhat, and so a rivalry founded on fiscal disparity is far less emotive than it once was. Still, that's not to say it has disappeared.

Since City won the league in 2012, they have picked up two major trophies, and Arsenal the same number. While the long-term effect of City's new money hasn't been as devastating as it once appeared, it has transformed the Manchester club into a major contender in English football, and ensured that they will compete at the top of the table for the foreseeable future. Arsenal and City are direct adversaries, and there is little sign of that changing anytime soon. Accordingly, their rivalry persists, albeit without so much of its philosophical and existential baggage. Meanwhile, though the memories may have faded somewhat, the fans still remember that header, that knee slide, and "ADEBAYOOOOR!"