Start to life at Arsenal for Arteta did not come easy. Joining Arsenal on December 22nd 2019 after spending 3 years as Pep Guardiola’s antirave, Artetas first season was plagued with uncertainty from the fans. Only managing to finish in 8th place and rack up 61 points after 38 games, live stats by Sports Loci.
Arteta inherited his Arsenal team from previous manager Unai Emery on December 20th 2019, a club arguably on a 15 year decline and that hasn’t seen success since the legendary Arsene Wenger. Previous to his appointment, Arteta was Pep Guardiola’s assistant coach, joining Manchester City on July 3rd 2016 and learning under Pep for the next 3 years, helping them win countless trophies with the team.
His first season at Arsenal resulted in similar results to Unai Emery’s side. At times there were lows, his job came in question many times in the media during bad runs, but Arteta managed to hold on and see his way into the light.
The team was in disarray struggling to find a way for star expensive signings to even play, but now seems to be a cohesive unit. Arteta has consistently fielded a similar XI, speaking towards the consistency Arteta is managing this 2022/2023 season.
Arsenal’s playing style this season is one to be marveled at, combining teachings of Cruyff – whom Arteta played under in his early days at Barcelona = and Pep Guardiola. Oleksandr Zinchenko is a brilliant example of this, cutting in from the left hand side into the midfield to provide an extra attacking presence, much like Barcelona and Manchester City.
The Role of Transfers
Arsenal have only signed players under 23 years of age since a previous tendency to only sign veteran mature players on big contracts or no players at all, spending very little under the last years of Arsene Wenger. The years after Arsene Wenger saw more money being spent but haphazardly on star expensive signings that did not give results. like Nicolas Pépé.
Since then the signings under Arteta have been more thoughtful catering to the tactical plan he wanted to carry out. This can be seen in the signings of Gabriel Jesus, Martin Ødegaard & Oleksandr Zinchenko who have all been brilliant in their start to life at Arsenal.
EPL Trophy
Arsenal are currently 1st in the league after 19 games played, sitting comfortably above second place Manchester City by 5 points with a game in hand. After a amazing start many wondered if Arsenal would be able to carry on with their momentum or if the start of the season was just a lucky run, but after 19 games and 20 games to go, they seem to be sitting in a great position to potentially win Arsenals first EPL trophy in over 10 years.
