Piero Hincapié said he wants to win the Premier League and the Champions League with Arsenal and that the club is on the brink of both ambitions. "I feel that excitement for the club," he said, adding that "On a personal level, it’s also important that in your first season you become champion. It would bring an immense happiness & be crazy for me too!"
Hincapié pointed to two immediate landmarks. Arsenal are "two games away" from another Premier League title and are set to face Paris Saint Germain in the Champions League final in Budapest on Saturday, May 30. He said the dressing room is charged: "There was something very exciting in the dressing room & a lot of desire to want to win everything." Arsenal travel to Burnley on Monday before closing the league campaign at home to Crystal Palace on the final day of the season.
The numbers underline why the moment matters. The club has not lifted the domestic crown in 22 years, and Arsenal have never won the European Cup. For a player still on a season-long loan, the stakes are unmistakable. "The truth is that it is a very nice moment that the club is going through to reach a Champions League final & to be two games away from another Premier League title," Hincapié said.
Hincapié is speaking from inside a team that believes it can complete a rare season. He said, "We have worked hard all season and, well, let's hope we are happy at the end of the season." The centre-back also reflected on his own adjustment: adapting to a new club and a new league was difficult at the beginning, and he singled out manager support, saying, "From the beginning he has always been supporting me in everything."
The context sharpens the story. Hincapié won the Bundesliga with Bayer Leverkusen in 2024 before joining Arsenal on a season-long loan this season. The club is set to make his move permanent, sources say, but that formal change has not yet been completed. That gap — a player talking about wanting to be a champion in his first season while still technically on loan — gives the moment an edge.
The tension is simple and public: a player pressing for silverware at one of the most consequential moments in the club’s recent history, while his contractual future is still in transition. Hincapié has been explicit about his personal aim and the team's mood, but the record shows Arsenal have not yet closed either door. Two league matches and a one-off final in Budapest will decide whether words turn into trophies.
On Monday and then on the final weekend, Arsenal must convert the dressing-room talk into results. Hincapié has tied his own first-season legacy to that task. If Arsenal win at least one of the competitions he is chasing, he will have been part of a campaign that ended a 22-year domestic wait and, should they lift the Champions League trophy, handed the club its first European Cup — outcomes that would match the "immense happiness" he promised.
