Steady hand guides sights of Gunners

Four decades down and into the fifth. Boy and man. He's lived in Avenell Road and Gillespie Road, both right beside Highbury. He's been a fan, an apprentice, the right back and the captain.

After that he was youth team coach, first team coach, assistant manager. From the midsixties to the 21st century. Is it any wonder that when Arsene Wenger speaks of Pat Rice, he speaks of "Pure Arsenal".

He doesn't get much wrong, Wenger, and his assessment of Rice is spot on. Rice spent three years at Watford under Graham Taylor after his playing days at Arsenal, but aside from that he has been as Highbury as marble. And as enduring.

As Wenger's assistant, arguably only David O'Leary's voice at Elland Road has a more influential Irish twang to it in the Premiership. Not that Rice's is particularly Irish now, or vocal. He gives interviews about as often as David Seaman gets his hair cut.

As someone who stands in the shadows, biographical details are required. Rice was born in Belfast 51 years ago.

Partly raised in the hills at Ballygowan, partly on the Grosvenor Road - "quite near Distillery, though the main team then was Linfield because of Jackie Milburn" - the family Rice moved to London for work when Pat was eight or nine.

He was a Manchester United fan then, but proximity to Highbury changed all that. He must have been a good young player, though he refuses to say so.

"Fortunate" is a word Rice uses about himself often. For example: "Quite rightly, I wasn't good enough to play for the district school side, but they said I could go and train with The Arsenal twice a week.

"I think they must have been short of players because they signed me on as an amateur. I was very, very fortunate. There were a lot, lot better players than me."

Despite that, Rice became an Arsenal regular, won the first of 49 Northern Ireland caps in 1969 and collected both league and FA Cup medals when Arsenal won the Double in 1971.

Eight years later he was Arsenal captain when they beat Manchester United 3-2 in the FA Cup final. When we talked a fortnight ago it was beneath a picture of Rice holding the trophy. It could be said he had a great career. But not by him.

Similarly, it could be said that he is as logical a choice to be the next Arsenal manager as anyone. Although Wenger yesterday appeared to have rebuffed the advances of Barcelona, he has not extended - or entered into talks about extending - a contract which expires next June.

It is 50/50 whether Wenger stays. There could be a vacancy. The question is: Would Rice want the job? Knowing Rice talks rarely publicly, an Arsenal player requested the question be asked - it is not idle speculation.

Rice has turned down at least one job offer recently. He was asked to be Northern Ireland manager before Sammy McIlroy. He explained his decision.

"It was a situation where you're with the team only every so often. That was one of the factors.

"The other was that in my own mind I wasn't sure whether I was ready for it, whether I could handle that situation. Obviously I asked Mr Wenger and he said it was up to me." Rice called Wenger "Mr" throughout the interview.

That Rice could worry about coaching Northern Ireland's footballers sounded like false modesty. "There's a lot more to it than that," he replied.

"Even now I still don't know if the opportunity came again whether I'd accept it. I'm sure there are more deserving people than I. I'm pleased that Sammy has got it."

Rice has no Belfast connections any more, unlike someone like McIlroy. But Arsenal, that's a different matter. Surely he wants to manage his club one day.

"I'm quite happy," he said. "I've got no aspirations of one day being the manager of Arsenal. You have got to be realistic. There is so much more to football.

"My boss can speak five different languages. His relaxation from football is watching football. You can speak to him about any player in the world and he will know him. That's vast knowledge.

"He's been managing now for 20 years, all that experience, all those contacts. At my age, I'm now 51, to try and go and pick up that knowledge would be a difficult undertaking.

"If I wasn't happy in what I was doing it might be different, but I am happy. I know from the outside people may think `Oh, he's got no ambition, he's got no this'. It's easy to say from the outside, but whenever you're on the inside it's different.

"The other thing is that, because I've been fortunate to be successful, there is always that fear of not being successful, of being a failure. I've always got that in the back of my mind." Then Rice added: "But you never know, maybe somewhere along the line I'll give it a shot."

If Wenger left and Rice got the offer? "That would be a different proposition. I was fortunate that, when we were waiting for Mr Wenger, for three or four weeks I took over." He doesn't add "successfully", but it was.

"I was lucky, if you've got quality players and they want to play for each other then you're three-quarters of the way there. It's getting there."

Such self-doubt tends not to get an airing in football. Wenger clearly has had a profound effect on Rice. Once he was a shouter and presumably 10 years ago he would have treated Nicolas Anelka less sensitively.

"Absolutely, absolutely." But not now. "No, not at all. It's not the style of Mr Wenger. It's not the style he likes in his coaching.

"Shouting from the touchline still goes on, but in the dressingroom you talk. The dressingroom is quiet regardless of whether we win, lose or draw - until the manager speaks."

How did Rice first feel about that? "It was very unusual, really unusual. But whenever I have spoken to the manager about it he's explained it to me and I can see where he's coming from. Because he used to be the same in his early days, he used to rant and rave.

"But what's the point in ranting at the end of the game? It's over. I think he is a very good man. An excellent manager, a handler of people. He's good for The Arsenal."

There was another culture shock in training. After Bertie Mee, Don Howe, George Graham, Rice thought it: "Completely alien. When we went to the first training camp I didn't think we'd done enough long distance running. He told me not to worry. The players went on to win the Double."

For Arsenal fans these issues are all part of a greater one about loss of identity. Once Arsenal were English with an Irish tinge. Today Arsenal are French with a hint of England. And they are going to leave Highbury.

"If you want to keep up with the big clubs then we're going to have to move," Rice said of the stadium. And on identity? "The most important thing to us is to have a nucleus of English players. But if you take someone like Patrick Vieira - would you say he was like a French player or an English player?

"You know that if Patrick Vieira is playing at Manchester or The Dell or at Wrexham he's going to go out to want to win. Of course it would be great if Dennis Bergkamp came from Camden Town. Sometimes it just doesn't happen."

With consecutive derbies against Tottenham coming up, Rice will be there, quietly ensuring The Arsenal do happen.