On the back of a poor start to the new Premier League season, Arsenal appeared to have turned around their fortunes.
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Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta will be keen to see his side maintain their recent momentum when they travel to Brighton & Hove Albion in the Premier League. On the back of a poor start to the new league season, Arsenal appeared to have turned around their fortunes. After losing their opening three league matches, the Gunners have won their last four matches, including three in the Premier League. From being heavily criticised at the beginning of the season, Arteta has been praised for the team’s recent resurgence. Ahead of their match against Brighton, Arteta was asked about being nominated for PL Manager of the Month. He was quoted as saying by the club’s website, “It is the beauty of this sport, we all know that. We all depend on results and perspective changes quickly in both ways, so you always have to be on your toes.”
When asked whether it will be a rollercoaster of a season, Mikel Arteta replied, “Hopefully not! This is what we want to avoid, we don’t want that, we want to be stable and consistent in performances, which will lead to results. We know this league is so competitive, anybody can beat you, anybody can put you under difficulty. You have to be on your toes because any detail can change any moment.”
Arteta has two quality goalkeepers at his disposal – Aaron Ramsdale and Bernd Leno. Speaking about the competition for places in his squad, the manager said, “Everybody has to raise the level and that’s really positive and is happening in different positions. You can see when players are coming in now, they are fully ready to take the place. Now it’s going to happen with Granit and before it happened when he was suspended, and it’s happened in other positions. Players are coming up and showing that they are ready because the way they train and the way they play is top so after they get rewarded when they have the minutes.”
Mikel Arteta also heaped praise on the new summer signing Ben White. “Well, I’ve been very impressed with how he handles the pressure and how he’s handled the situation of coming through the Euros and paying the big fee and the composure and the calmness that he’s shown. And as well, the willingness to learn, to improve, because he’s realised that he is still really young, still in the development process and there are things that he can improve. We are already enjoying [our time] together and we have to continue like that.”
Speaking about Emile Smith Rowe’s potential, Arteta said, “We will see, he is very good right now and he can still get much better. There are things in his game that he must improve and develop and he is so hungry to do that. It will depend on how the team is helping, we can help his confidence and his head, how he takes the next step and how he handles praise and how he handles negativity and pressure as well.”
Mikel Arteta is also happy to see the fans in the stadium, saying, “I’ve always said that I’ve been here for 18/20 months and for 16 or 17 of those months, we haven’t had our people with us. It’s impossible to build anything [like that] because they are the biggest part of our foundation and when they are with us and when they are embracing what we are doing, you see the difference because they are able to create momentum and create the energy and the passion that they did at the weekend and when that happens, the team responds.”
