The original source of the interview appears to be HUMO that I can't access.
If that's one of the floating summary sources of the "arrogance debate":
Op 12 december maakt Mathieu van der Poel zijn wederoptreden in de cross. De wereldkampioen doet dat na een wegcampagne waarin hij de Ronde van Vlaanderen won, na een oerstrijd tegen Wout van Aert. “De nieuwe generatie, we hebben het allemaal: de beuk erin!”, zegt hij trots in een interview met...
www.nieuwsblad.be
... then I am absolutely with your interpretation.
As readers, we do not even see the questions that the journalist asked VDP. Accordingly, I assume that the catchphrase and the frame around "arrogance" were initiated by the media itself and VDP only picks it up.
"This may seem arrogant to us" is for me an indication that the journalist was explicitly interested in the occurrence of RE and could have placed the term "arrogance" in his question.
In fact, VDP invalidates an alleged arrogance with
"borderline statements". Finally he draws the bow to himself and declares that high ambitions and great self-confidence could always be interpreted as arrogance and that he is here not that different from Remco because he does the same. They are both great athletes who follow their words with results. Some good and honest statements by Mathieu I would assume.