Paul Merson admits he’s been proven wrong by Mikel Arteta through his first few months as Arsenal head trainer. Arteta was named to Unai Emery in December as the successor. After spending three years as an assistant coach at Manchester City the Spaniard had never handled it earlier.
Arteta drawn one has won 2 and lost one of the four games in control of the Gunners. In which they conquer Championship leaders Leeds, the success came on Monday in the next round of the FA Cup.
The first half was dominated by Leeds and might have taken a lead.
However, Arsenal were improved after the break and Merson claims the revealing was typical of Arteta has begun his own tenure.
“No it was not an appointment I encouraged ] in the start when I am being truthful,” Merson said on The Debate.
“I thought for somebody to come in who has never been a boss before, to come to a large club like Arsenal, I believed it’d be a battle, I know he has worked with Pep Guardiola.
“However, what I have seen in the past couple of months, there have been two or three games in which it is the first time that I’ve seen Arsenal for quite a while and that I have not presumed Arsene Wenger has become the manager.
“They attempted to shut at Chelsea after which they kind of faded second half and got exhausted, which they will do if you are not utilized to doing this.
“And the way they played against United they form of knew their tasks from United.
“And [against Leeds], exactly what I enjoyed about him is he is gone in at half time they had been lucky to not be two or three or even four down, and he flipped it about, he has the players and they have come back and won the match fairly convincingly in the long run and they were outstanding.
“So yeah, he is turning me about a bit, but he’ll need gamers ” Adhering to the Leeds triumph, Arteta confessed that he made it clear to his players at the time he wasn’t pleased.
Arteta explained, “When I see exactly what I do not need to see and I am not talking about technically and tactically – exactly what I expect from these and also the criteria that we desired to sit in some specific locations, I cannot be happy and I must let them understand.
“I’m learning each day. They respond should they lose, if they lose, what they want, what they want whenever they win.
“And also, how do they respond when they wish to.”
