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| Arsenal started this season badly and got worse, leaving new
signing Mikel Arteta wondering if he should have stayed in the
northwest. But he tells Sport things are looking brighter in north London now… |
Mikel Arteta has had just four hours’ sleep when he greets
Sport.
Not that you’d know it, for the hair remains perfectly coiffed, the
stubble suitably designer. The Arsenal midfielder returned to London
from Liverpool in the early hours of the morning having played all 90
minutes of the Gunners’ hard-fought (and some might say fortunate) 1-0
victory at his former home, Goodison Park.
“It was very emotional for me,” he says earnestly. “I spent the biggest
part of my career playing there for Everton, so to get the reception
that I got was very special. I thanked the chairman last night because I
always said to him: ‘One day when I leave this club, please we have to
do it the right way because I respect this club and love it a lot. And I
really mean it when I say it.’”
After pausing to thank the obligatory PR character for delivering him a
glass of water, Arteta moves swiftly on to talk about the club that
prised him away from Everton. “For me it was a big move and I was so
pleased to get it done,” he says. “I’ve always been a big admirer of
Arsenal, of the tradition and the way they play football.”
Into the eye of a storm
But his arrival came amid a turbulent time for the Gunners – just three days after that mauling at Old Trafford.
“It was a very difficult start to the season for the club, and I think
the [8-2] defeat against Manchester United was probably the toughest
point,” he reflects.
“Was there shock in the changing room? There was because, for a club
like Arsenal to lose the way they did, it was difficult to take –and
against a direct rival like United it was even tougher. They had sold
some big players and then had a result like that – it doesn’t help the
stability of the club.”
Ditto for getting steamrollered by AC Milan in the first leg of a
Champions League last-16 tie: “For me personally, that game at Milan was
the lowest time of this season. We didn’t play at the level that we
should have played and we deserved to lose the game. At 4-0 it was too
much... though we nearly did it at home.”
With the memory of what was to follow in the second leg, when Arsenal
so nearly performed the miracle of Champions League miracles, Arteta
smiles. But before the Gunners left their supporters dreaming of what
might have been at the Emirates, they had left them snarling at the
Stadium of Light.
A 2-0 defeat to Sunderland in the FA Cup fifth round saw yet another
chance for silverware slip from Arsenal’s careless grasp. Fingers
pointed at Wenger, with some outside the club proclaiming his tenure had
turned stale. “I don’t read a lot of the press because I’m foreign,”
Arteta says almost apologetically.
“But Arsene knows that he has our support, and we know that he’s always
been behind and protecting the players – it’s a mutual concept. There’s
never been a scary moment, like ‘what’s going to happen with him?’ or
whatever. Since I came here I know who is the boss, I know who runs the
club; it’s very clear.”
Turning point
The dissenting voices faded when, eight days after their FA Cup
failure, a switch seemed to flick on Arsenal’s season. A thrilling 5-2
victory over Tottenham was followed by a further four consecutive
Premier League wins – a run that has seen them overhaul their north
London rivals and move into the top three for the first time this
season.
“We got to a point when we had to say: ‘Listen, we have to go game by
game because they are too far from us at the moment to be thinking we
can finish third, fourth or even fifth,’” says Arteta.
“I think we were 17th in the table the first game I played against
Swansea, so there was a long way to go – but we’ve done it and everyone
has put tremendous effort and belief into keeping going because, at one
point, I was thinking that the season was over.
“Now we just try to finish as high as we can. There is nothing else to
play for. We’re disappointed that we have dropped out of the Champions
League and the cup against Sunderland, but we’re third now – and we have
to try and maintain that because it takes you directly to the Champions
League.”
Millions matter
But Arsenal must also address their domestic desires if they’re to
close the gap with the Manchester clubs next season. Here comes the
million-dollar question, then: is competing for the league title simply a
question of cash?
“Well, obviously if you spend a lot of money to bring top players, you
have a better chance – you have a bigger squad and you can change the
team around,” Arteta explains. “For me, a key thing with our squad is
that we’ve been hit with long-term injuries the whole season that really
affect the team.
I always said I would like to see this team playing with the same 11
for 10 to 15 games, and then we could say if we were good enough or not
to do it. Now we’re starting to do that and we are getting good results.
So the biggest concern is to stop the injuries.”
He’s forgetting something – or someone – else, though. Robin van Persie.
The player whose name scrawled on an Arsenal contract this summer would
be the most celebrated of any possible new arrivals (barring Leo Messi,
perhaps, but we’ll eat our hats, socks and shoes if that happens).
“How important is it that Robin stays?” Arteta smiles as he repeats the
question. “Very important. [Laughs] He’s the one who’s been making the
difference. You need someone to put the ball in the net, and Robin has
done it more than any other player in the league. He’s probably one of
the best in Europe, which means without him it wouldn’t be the same.
"I don’t know if you replaced him how it would be, but we don’t want to be in that situation.”
He’s still smiling when he finishes the sentence, but there’s no doubt
about the seriousness behind it. Arteta might be one of the new boys at
Arsenal, but if Wenger’s in any doubt about how to bring the good times
back to the club, he could do worse than ask the Spaniard. Let him have a
few more hours’ kip first though, eh?
