Nacho Monreal has had his praises sung by Arsene Wenger following his impressive display for Arsenal in their win over Chelsea.
The Gunners earned a 2-1 win over the Blues at the Emirates on Wednesday night, but it was far from plain sailing on the way to victory.
The away team started the match in emphatic fashion, and our defence was severely under pressure from wave after wave of attack, and the visitors managed to get the ball in the back of the net twice within the opening 10 minutes, although luckily for our boys, the first was rightly ruled out for offside.
Our defence managed to settle themselves and manage the relentless comings from our rivals, and Chelsea failed to seriously challenge David Ospina throughout the match.
Arsene Wenger has moved to throw a barrage of praise on Nacho Monreal, who has been one of our best and most consistent players throughout the campaign, as well as last night.
“For me he gets very much credit, but maybe there’s a bit less focus on him because he’s not a candidate for the English national team, he doesn’t make many statements or is maybe not a lot on social networks,” Wenger told a news conference.
“But our job is about performances. I like the word ‘silent leaders.’ That means people come, they perform, they don’t talk, they go home, and they come in the next morning, they train well, and the next day they do it again.
“They are the real leaders in the teams.”
Wenger admits enjoying last night’s result, and even insisted that his side enjoyed the newfound freedom from uncertainty following Alexis Sanchez’s exit.
“It’s a great satisfying night for us because we managed to beat a strong team. I felt that in January we paid a heavy price for the uncertainty that was existing in our dressing room,” Wenger said.
“Now we are back with more clarity, we know what we have to do, we can focus on our game.”
Did Monreal deserve to be singled out for praise? Has he been our most consistent player this season?
Pat J
It shows a lot when the players did not wish Alexis farewell but most of them welcomed Mkhitaryan. Goes to show the type of environment we had in our dressing room. I hope this could be a turning point for the team. Add Aubameyang and I’m sure he wouldn’t miss that Iwobi chance today. On to the finals ??.
noticed that too. A lot of Coquelin goodbyes and Walcott goodbyes…. Most i saw for Alexis was a instagram story from Mustafi. I think Xhaka was Alexis’ only real friend at the club. Sad things turned out bad in the dressing room. Not what you want to see, and it defintley effected results.
he should get a ton. Who remembers when him and Gibbs were neck and neck for starting spot and then Monreal just blew him away and secured it? Monreal is one of the few players I always feel pretty secure having in the team. We’re lucky to have him.
Even when everybody was raving about Kola and Monreal was playing centre back, I always thought we missed him at left back. Now hopefully Wenger’s gone back to back four and done away with the three centre halves, took him long enough, and Monreal can revert to his rightful position. Also I’d like to add, Bellerin looks more comfortable in a back four, in fact the whole team do.
I want to see a back 4 as well, I fear a back 4 without a DM though and we need AMN in the middle along with a top DM for him to learn from and rotate with.
If ElNeny had been a real DM then I doubt Chelsea would have been such a threat, I think a DM is more important than a CB for the back 4.
You’re right Midkemma, we desperately need a top defensive midfielder although I must say Elneny has done decent job in the couple of games.
Well I don’t THINK a DM is more important than a CB. I KNOW it is . And HAVE known ever since Gilberto left , ten seasons ago. Disgracefully , Wenger doesn’t even seem to notice, let alone care enough to actually do what he is paid for and plug that decade long gaping hole at DM. The imposter Xhaka is just the latest in a series of clowns Wenger has put there and just hoped for the best over a decade now!
Monreal is very solid.
He was one of many 10m or less
buys which proved very valuable.
Cech 10m
Sagna 7m Mertz 10 m Koz 10 m. Monreal.10 m
Coquelin free Song 4m
Walcott 5m Ramsey 5m Rosicky 6m
Giroud 10 m
If we put a 12m limit on transfer fees
we may be just as successful.
And all, bar Coquelin, signed many years ago when the market was completely different. So an untrue comparison by you. I would argue that Merts, Coquelin, Walcott were any good. I thought Merts catastrophically and damagingly slow, Coquelin very limited and as for Walcott, well don’t even get me started on my all time foe. I am still celebrating that he is now Evertons problem , not ours.
Monreal is usually the unsung hero of the match. Skillful, fast, aggressive, hard to be beaten and tough in physical duels.
He is very good, but he is soon to be 32 years old. Kolasinac should learn from him.
Last few games Monreal has made use of the chances that came his way. Good to see him noticed.
Unnoticed is the Hazard stopper Elneny.
Was a very clever tactic too, so unnoticed is Elneny and the boss.
We are def good at LB position
Monreal is one of our bestest players innit
He is very good but Kolsanic is even better.
I think Wenger got Kolsanic because he was free agent. I don’t think he would have got a Top LB otherwise. I think Wenger wanted Monreal to be number 1 and to get a youth to replace Gibbs but Im very happy we got Kolsanic too.
We need another CB and DM though
The only thing Kola’s got over Monreal is strength, Mon’s better with positional play, overlapping, getting behind the full back, crossing, making goals and even scoring the odd goal. Altogether a better full back. Kola would be better pushing forward to the left side of the midfield or even converting him to a central defender.
everyone knows the best Nachos are in Monreal!! to me only one player in the PL that does what monreal does with his consistent performances is his spaniard counterpart dave. so yes he is underrated, and has been solid these past two seasons our most consistent player.
Am very happy last night, no coquelin no walcott and alexis, i don’t belief it, thanks rudiger may your days belong, thanks to all arsenal player and your grate manager,monreal as don a grate job he told the fans to forget about alexis in is jubilation againt palace, i am very happy we get him.
The arsenal fans that goes to see the team play every week should be create a song for Nacho monreal to Praise him. Nacho does his duty week in week out, the least the fans can do is do theres .
Monreal has spells of being on fire. I’d say that’s prob true for most players that they have good spells and bad spells, depending on length of time from each would define whether consistent enough or not. Monreal was talked about like this at the start of last season, but then he gave his worst ever form in my opinion for almost the rest of the season. We cried out for a new LB. We had to change shape. This season Monreal has put in some good performances at CB, some iffy ones too but mostly he’s not been the worst culprit back there. When Monreal is fit and fresh he’s a very dynamic player, like Ramsey and Alexis he’s action Jackson. But sometimes his mind tires along with his body as does when they get older.
A good post and fine use of perspective. Surely you know that most fan sites and fans do not welcome perspective though. It spoils their own prejudices and rants. Totally agree on Monreal. His winning attitude last night (once again) stood out a mile. But we have an old defence plus two raw, young , not good enough CB’s and REAL money , right now, needs to be spend on whole defence and esp a PROPER CDM.
Monreal along with Elneny and Ozil were clearly our best performers.In the first half our centre backs Wilshire and xhaka were poor.Thankfully they improved second half when we matched up with the Chelsea system