Coming into the new season, Mikel Arteta had a private conversation with Declan Rice. The topic was his role on the pitch.
“I went to him and I said: ‘you are not the lighthouse anymore. You are something else,'” the Arsenal manager revealed after the 2-1 win over Leeds, after Rice set up Bruno Guimaraes’ winner.
“At the end of the season, I can tell you what [and] where I want to take him. But he’s not the lighthouse anymore, he’s something else and he needs to prove that on the pitch.”
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For those confused about what football and light towers have in common, Rice was previously heralded as the ‘lighthouse’ of the Arsenal team.
“Somebody who brings a focal point, clarity and direction to everybody,” said Arteta last season. “You look at him and you know where to head.”
The lighthouse tag followed Rice everywhere after he joined Arsenal in 2023. It was the same term Pep Guardiola used to describe Rodri at Manchester City.
“Guardiola tells me to be the coach on the field. He compares my position to that of a lighthouse,” said the former City midfielder, now at Barcelona. “Don’t move, let everything revolve around you.”
It sounds like a traditional defensive midfielder position, focused on an off-the-ball influence. But those days are over. Rice has a new role in this team – and this season has heralded a new version of Rice.
When it comes to improvement one area stands out from the Arsenal and England man so far this term – his passing ability in open play.
In six league games this season, Rice has three assists from open play, more than he managed in the entire of the 2025/26 Premier League campaign. And not only that, but all three of those assists are similar.
Two of them were for Guimaraes goals against Sunderland and Leeds – both set up the Brazilian from outside the box, both set up long-range goals, both put Arsenal in front during sticky situations.
Rice has set up not just one but two Bruno Guimaraes goals this season
The other assist was a quick ball through the lines for Kai Havertz’s goal against Chelsea. Again, that was a strike that generated space for the German to shoot from outside the box. Again, that equaliser got Arsenal out of a tricky hole.
All of these moments are part of a wider picture that Rice has gone up a level in possession, showing a dramatic improvement in terms of attacking influence on the ball.
Rice is playing more of an active role in the final third of the pitch this season. The number of final-third entries he has averaged this season has gone up by 25 per cent compared to last season. That figure has also doubled since the 2024/25 campaign.
Rice has also made far more passes in the final third of the pitch than last season, while the number of line-breaking passes he has averaged this season has once again nearly doubled.
He is finding gaps between the opposition players more often. He is more than just a defensive midfielder focused on off-the-ball protection.
This has been a clear shift in terms of Rice’s output from open play, which was often criticised for passing sideways and backwards far too often. Well, he has improved in that discipline too.
Not only has Rice’s forward passing numbers gone up – but the number of backwards passes he averages has gone down by 50 per cent.
That reduction in backwards passes is to be expected given Rice has also undergone a positional change at Arsenal.
He now sits more at the base of the Arsenal midfield – allowing for Myles Lewis-Skelly and Guimaraes to have a greater effect going forward. That contrasts massively to the ‘left eight’ role he used to have.
Declan Rice is playing deeper and on the right side of a midfield pivot this season having played as a left-sided No 8 two seasons ago
But there are still moments – such as Rice’s backheel assist for Guimaraes’ winner against Leeds – where he still impacts the penalty area. And it creates a wider point about the midfielder’s new role: the old version Rice still exists.
He still makes those tactically fascinating runs forward to create chaos. He still carries the ball forward with lung-bursting runs that we’ve seen in previous seasons. He is still that set piece threat from corners.
But Rice has now added open play passing to his and Arteta’s Arsenal. He can crash the penalty box but also sit in front of the back four. He is effective in the dead ball and open play scenarios.
Many wanted a new type of Arsenal from the efficient, defensive, set-piece-influenced team that won the Premier League last season.
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But Rice is summing up this slightly different Arsenal. Like Rice’s assist numbers, all of Arsenal’s goals are from open play. They haven’t scored from a set piece since March.
Arsenal are evolving. Rice, at the heart of the team, is evolving with them.
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