First things first; everyone else is a rival, Liverpool are the enemy. As I always say, if Space Jam were real, and the Martians played Liverpool, I’d want the earth to die.
On Arsenal or City, I live in Manchester (used to live on Busby Way) and I’d rather City won it. As others have said, no one cares. You hear more about our treble from over 25 years ago than you do about their’s from a couple of seasons ago (I couldn’t even tell you the specific season, that’s how few f**ks I give).
Humans communicate through stories and sport is no different; the narrative is really important. City’s story is they got bought by an oil state who handed over bottomless riches to best in class decision makers who methodically and sensibly spent that money to make them good. That is an incredibly dull story; it captures no hearts and minds and it’s why neutral fans are broadly indifferent to them.
The interesting parallel is Chelsea, because they also got untold riches pumped into them, but, and here’s the twist… the guy doing it was a bit of a madman. He wasn’t sensible with a long term vision, he’d hire and fire managers and spunk huge sums on strikers the team didn’t need. That’s a far more interesting story; it’s got ups and downs, twists and turns.
As for Arsenal, I can’t speak for anyone else, but I find the whole club to be the embodiment of their manager, and I think he’s one of the most gratingly irritating men to have ever graced the league. The football of Pulis, the pushing of the rules of Jose, the high performance stunt wankery of Brentan, the touchline performative nonsense of Pep and Klopp and the accent of Rafa. I can’t stand the bloke and I want him to fail.
