Here is every word Mikel Arteta said during his pre-match press conference ahead of Arsenal’s clash with Fulham
Mikel Arteta spoke to the press ahead of Arsenal’s Premier League clash with Fulham at the Emirates Stadium. The Gunners know they can move as many as six points clear of their title rivals Manchester City before they travel to Everton on Monday night.
There were updates on players in the wake of the result in Madrid, with Jurrien Timber, Martin Odegaard and Kai Havertz all in focus. Plus, there were further questions about the officiating during the draw, which saw three penalty decisions make headlines.
With the high of Europe, switching attention to the Premier League title could be something of a challenge. The pressure is on, and the emotions of playing a big role at the Emirates Stadium.
Here is every word Arteta said:
Can we start with any fresh injury concerns after Wednesday? Is everything looking okay?
I think so. Let’s see how everybody is tomorrow morning. We haven’t been able to train much, so tomorrow we’ll have the final update.
Sorry to throw names at you, but Jurrien Timber, Havertz and Odegaard. Odegaard actually came off it. Will he be okay?
Yeah, Kai and Jurgen will be out.
Okay, but Martin, you’re confident?
Let’s see.
You said you were fuming on Wednesday night. Two days on, what would you say the overriding emotion is for you just now?
Focus on Fulham and hunger. Hunger to play, hunger to compete, hunger to win, hunger to be closer to achieving our dream.
Has the club received an explanation from UEFA about that decision making and have you sought one?
I don’t know. I haven’t spoken to them in the last few hours, so I don’t know. We’ll deal with that on Monday. Now it’s Fulham.
A feeling of injustice can often be quite a powerful emotion. Can you use that emotion to maybe fuel your players going into the run-in?
Maybe, but I think we have enough fuel in the tank. We’re playing to win the Premier League. It’s exactly what we want it to be. Four games to go, this game too.
The reason I ask that is because you often hear about something called a siege mentality. Is that something that you feel that you can bring to your squad and that you have? That maybe you have that siege mentality within you at the moment?
We certainly have that. We need to face any context, any situation to achieve our goal. What happened tonight was extremely disappointing and we need to make it at home now.
You see your players every single day. You work with them every single day. When you look at the whites of their eyes, what are you seeing?
Hunger. Hunger to win. That’s it. To compete, to prepare and to achieve the goal that we set at the start of the season.
The fans are likely to be kicking every ball and be on edge if you like until the end of the season. What would your message with just a few games to go now be to them?
Let’s keep doing what we did all season and bring that energy, that passion and together we’re going to make it happen.
Just finally from me, last week you talked about courage from your players. Is it now almost a test of nerve more than anything else from now to the end of the season?
It’s a lot of factors. That’s something that emotionally for sure we have to manage in the right way. But I would put the emphasis more on showing that desire, that determination, that hunger, that will that we’ve shown all season and even more. Because we have only four games to play now and everything is at stake so it doesn’t get better than that.
Fulham have conceded more goals than anyone else in the first 15 minutes of the second half. Arsenal in the Premier League have scored the most in that time period, 14 goals. What’s so sacred about that half-time for you and why do you think it’s been so successful for you to come out and keep going?
The first thought is that we try to prepare and understand what happened in the first half and try to apply it immediately in the second half. There will be a lot of factors I’m sure to get those stats and it’s very positive. What we want is throughout every 15-minute block of the game to have the ability to do that.
Marco Silva’s Fulham only two points off sixth place, they’re having a very good season. What have you made of it? Because Arsenal have very good stats against Fulham but it’s never an easy game.
No, it’s a remarkable job what Marco is doing. I’ve said it many times in my opinion, he’s one of the best managers in the league. The way he sets up his team and what he’s done for the club, it’s incredible so we know how tough it’s going to be tomorrow.
Saka, following a ball carry across the pitch has the most shots, most chances created. Is that what you want to see overall from your midfield and attack instead of grabbing the ball, maybe crossing it back, passing to the side, pushing up a bit more?
Yes, penetration is one of the words we use the most and taking player’s initiative and making things happen. Through the passes, obviously, it’s extremely difficult against teams that are so organised, so we need to find other ways, and that’s the kind of thing that we’re looking forward to.
I know that Kai Havertz has had a broken season, so how has that been for you to deal with through this whole campaign, having someone who’s so key to you and especially now with so many big games coming up?
He’s been a huge miss. We’re talking about one of the most important attacking players that we have, and he’s been out for seven or eight months. He’s not been the only one, unfortunately, with long-term injuries and plays that we’ve missed. The team has shown an incredible capacity to overcome these kinds of scenarios and still be very competitive.
In the summer he has two years left on his contract, which traditionally is where a club extends or potentially discussions about a player moving on. So how important is this end of this season and the World Cup for Kai Havertz going forward?
Now the focus has to be on availability and performance, and Kai is desperate to be on the pitch as quickly as possible. He cannot be for this game, but hopefully for Atletico he will be available and he’s pushing in every boundary to achieve that. There is no time to have these kinds of discussions now.
You mentioned not being able to train much, can I ask a little insight about what that’s like between games when training is almost impossible? What does that week become for you and the team?
Well, first of all recovery and then clarity on what we have to do, what we expect from the opponent and especially what we have to do to take the game where we want it, to win it. And when you don’t have much time on the pitch, you have to do it in other ways, other methods, a lot of collective messages and especially individual meetings to achieve what we want on the pitch.
And just something on the structure of the midfield, tell me if I’m wrong but I feel like we’ve noticed that Declan has been kind of dropping a bit deeper than Martin recently. Martin’s kind of been pushing up a little bit more and doing more in the final third. What’s behind that change and the benefits that it brings?
Well, every opponent has their things, and I believe in the last game that it was the best thing to do, to hurt them, to find spaces, time and surprise them with certain movements and in relation to the opponent, we can change that. And to have the variability and the options to do that with our midfielders I think is something positive for the team.
Another one on Rice, you obviously did give him a slightly deeper role against Atletico the other day. How impressed were you with how he performed and I guess his mentality to drive the team forward there?
Well, what we need is players that can occupy any position on the field. More than football I think it’s going in that direction. When you’re a midfielder, you’re a midfielder at six and eight or at ten. If we want a total team we better have total players to do that, to be so comfortable, to be dominant in any area of the pitch, to dominate every phase of play and Declan certainly is working in that direction.
And when it comes to player of the season, he’s obviously one of those in the running for that, probably someone like Bruno Fernandes too. How important do you think performing in multiple competitions every few days in Europe should be when it comes to those kind of awards?
Well, what Declan is doing again, it’s incredible. To play the amount of games, minutes, with the quality that he’s shown in every game is something extremely difficult to do. And he’s doing it not only this season but the last few seasons that he’s been with us. And to show that level of consistency is extremely rare because the demands and the standards are very, very high.
I want to ask you quickly about Eberechi Eze. We’ve heard you talk a lot in recent weeks about the beauty of the challenge in front of you, the need for your players to enjoy it and enjoy these moments. It feels like very few players embody that more than him. It feels like he plays the same way if it’s a pre-season friendly or a Champions League semi-final. Is that one of his most special qualities?
I think so, I think it’s part of his character, and he has a unique way of expressing himself. Inside, none of us know how he’s feeling, but what he actually transmits to the world outside is such a security and calmness and composure in every situation on the field.
And is that something you think he can transmit to his teammates as well?
It does and especially the way he talks and connects with people is very much like that. I think that’s something special. I think we need players like that, we need players that can have a different kind of presence on the pitch and body language. And Ebs brings something else that I think is unique and very powerful for the team.
This Fulham game obviously comes between two Champions League semi-finals. You lost to Bournemouth in between the quarter-final ties. Is there anything you can learn from the preparation or the approach this time to make sure it’s a better result?
Yes, well, the time of the game is going to be different to start with. And hopefully the game and the result will be very different. The game especially when the game turned and how efficient they were with certain actions. We know the difficulty of the opponent, and of the schedule but I sense it in the team. We want it that much that tomorrow we’re going to be fresh again and ready to go.
A couple of years ago you lost to Villa in the middle of the Bayern Munich tie. Is this kind of turnaround one of the key areas you need to find a bit more improvement?
I want to think about all the turnarounds that we have so difficult that we won. But yes, we can learn from the positive ones, from the other ones, we know we want to win every single game, which is very difficult to do. We have prepared in the best possible way since the moment that the final whistle went in Atletico. We’ve done everything that we possibly can to give ourselves the best chance to recover, to bring the right energy, to prepare the game in the right way. And now it’s about the selection and performance on the pitch.
Just generally, is it something that the Premier League should help English teams with? Just this turnaround?
Ideally, yes. We all know that. If they can do that, that would be great.
On the crowd at the Emirates, obviously a lot has been made of the nerves over the last couple of months. Do you feel that the players feel that on the pitch?
That’s a question for the players. I’m extremely grateful for the support, the atmosphere that we have created at the Emirates. We always want more, we always want better. We always want every single action to be so positive behind the players. The more we do that, we all know that the outcome is going to be much better. And I’m sure tomorrow is going to be such a special game when there’s so much to play for and so little still. So we know everybody has to be at it.
It’s just for you, a question for the players. Do you feel that, because I’ve seen at times you’ve done a bit of [calming action] to the crowd?
I think that’s part of my job as well, because I know what we are trying to do. I put the right example the other day when we played the short corners as well. We are so convinced of what we have to do and let the players make the decisions, especially when they are on the ball. When we are defending and to push them and to do that, I think it’s great. When they have the ball, we need to allow them to make that decision. Because probably they’re going to take it because they are so good at the right one most of the time.
