On Thursday, September 8, 2022, the London Bridge collapsed as the Royal Family announced the death of Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II, the longest-serving monarch.
The family announced on their Twitter page that "The Queen died peacefully at Balmoral this afternoon."
Elizabeth was involved in several football activities during her 7-decade reign, and her death drew an outpouring of tribute from the football world.
Despite her regular involvement in the sport by attending finals and presenting trophies, the club with which she was affiliated was a closely guarded secret about which people could only speculate and rumour.
With her high status, she was expected to be neutral in her participation in activities which she did. But over time, her affiliation with Arsenal came to light but was not overt.
There are two statements and on top of it a gesture that quite validates her love for Arsenal.
Former Leader of the Labour Party, Jeremy Corbyn once said in a speech: ‘Now, we know the Queen is absolutely above politics. She may be above football, too, but many locals harbour this quite secret view that she’s actually, privately, a Gooner,’ he said as quoted by metro.co.uk.
In 2007, Queen Elizabeth was scheduled to inaugurate Arsenal's new stadium, the Emirates Stadium, but due to unfortunate reasons, she could not do so.
The monarch made up for the miss by inviting the first-team squad to Buckingham Palace for an afternoon tea and tour of the palace.
After the event, Thierry Henry said: “It went really nicely. I have no words to describe the experience the Queen has given us.”
"It seems the Queen follows football and she told us she was an Arsenal fan," Fabregas is quoted as saying. "She appeared to definitely know who I was and we exchanged a few special words."
To this day, Arsenal is the only team that has visited the Palace for tea with the Queen.
Watch the video below
EE/KPE
