Declan Rice just confirmed what Arsenal fans already knew about him

Arsenal midfielder Declan Rice has been one of the best signings the club has made in recent years.

Before his arrival, Arsenal were desperately looking for a player who would will his team to victory. There were some really good players, but none of them were quite 'mentality monsters' like Rice had proven to be, winning the Conference League with West Ham.

Rice is not perfect - no one is - but he is one of the most consistent performers in world football at the moment, and is a huge reason why Arsenal are Premier League champions.

He may not give you the 10/10 performances once every month, but his rating would rarely dip beyond eight.

Declan Rice just confirmed what Arsenal fans already knew about him

Everyone at Arsenal knows how important he is, and even more so in big games. Rice was asked about this in a recent interview with UEFA, when he basically confirmed what fans have known about him all along.

He said: “I would like to say I'm a big-game player. When you play in the biggest competitions, you need your players to step up at every single point, and not only just me.

"I think our team have done that over the last few years in big games – we've stepped up, especially in the Champions League. There's a few of us that have got that in us, and we're going to need that going into the final as well.

“In football, you can't determine before the game whether you're going to play well or not. It's the unknown. But what you can control is how you start the game off, how [much] confidence you can build within yourself.

"Whether that's with your first touch, a tackle, a header, always do the first thing right, and you build from there.”

Everyone at Arsenal knows that he is a big game player. That is not to say Rice has not had mediocre performances in big games - every single player has had those sorts of performances in football - but more often than not, Rice delivers.

The Englishman is the sort of leader that you would want on your team in every single big game. He may not score every single goal, he may not get the assists, but he does everything in the middle.

He also is very much capable of scoring goals. He is more than capable of defending like an elite defensive midfielder if needed. We saw both of those things happen against Real Madrid last season, and in countless performances this season as well.

So many times, you would see a Rice assist or goal to win Arsenal the game, and those are the things he is there for. To do a little bit of everything and make sure that they win.

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