​Since signing in summer 2024, Mariona Caldentey has played the joint-most Women’s Super League and Champions League games for Arsenal alongside Alessia Russo with 43 [Getty Images]Mariona Caldentey has won four Champions Leagues, six Spanish titles, six Spanish Cups, a European Championship and a World Cup – but her eyes light up when discussing Arsenal’s hopes of silverware in the upcoming 2026-27 season.With the Gunners chasing a first Women’s Super League title since 2019, along with two domestic cups and another Champions League, she is explicit about what she expects.”We have to do it – now it has to be our time.”The last time Caldentey, 30, was spotted in an Arsenal shirt was in May, standing on an open-top bus as part of the men’s and women’s victory parade around north London.Hundreds of thousands of supporters lined the streets to celebrate a first Premier League title in 22 years for the men, with Caldentey and her team-mates also showing off the inaugural Women’s Champions Cup they won against Brazilian side Corinthians in February.It was a prize to cherish last season but, having finished second in the WSL and had their Champions League defence ended by an 87th-minute Lyon winner in their semi-final second leg, the Spain midfielder wants to put things right this season.”We need to take the next step and are ready for it,” she said. “We need to be ambitious, have no fear and believe in ourselves.”That does not mean we are going to win it – there are other things that we cannot control, but that’s the message.”We are professional athletes at a big club and we have to deal with pressure. We accept it and I think it’s a cool part of the job.”Why fast start crucial to Arsenal’s title chancesBoss Renee Slegers is equally bullish about Arsenal’s targets for this season and is expecting her players to deliver.”We are in a really good place,” she told the Women’s Football Weekly podcast. “We need to be bold and explicit – we want to win the Women’s Super League, and, of course, the Treble.”Last season, Arsenal won only four of their first nine games. By contrast, eventual champions Manchester City recovered from losing their opening match at Chelsea to rattle off 13 straight wins and seize control of the title race.Replicating such a start will leave Arsenal’s dreams of a first WSL title in eight seasons in tatters – and it could not be much tougher, with early trips to Stamford Bridge and Etihad Stadium.They also travel to Brighton where they lost in the FA Cup quarter-finals in April and who, a month later, held them 1-1 to guarantee City the title. However, after the novelty of a full pre-season, Slegers is confident of a faster start this time.”Some players haven’t had that since 2017, 2018, and you can see that,” she said. “They come back with so much energy, so much excitement.”I think honestly they’ve been decompressing, recharging. Sometimes you understand what you’re missing when it’s not there. I think that’s what the players have go