‘Can’t speak highly enough’ – ESR full of praise for midfield signing

Emile Smith Rowe has spoken out about his admiration for new team-mate Fabio Vieira, likening the new Arsenal signing to Manchester City’s Bernardo Silva.

The Gunners moved to add the Portuguese midfielder to their squad after an impressive season for Porto last term, where he notched up seven goals and 16 assists, and he now has the chance to try and showcase his talents in the English top flight.

It will be interesting to see which role manager Mikel Arteta has in mind for Vieira, with him able to operate as an AM or out wide, but if Smith Rowe’s comments are anything to go by, he could well be set to feature more on the wing after he was likened to Bernardo Silva.

‘He’s very similar [to Silva],” Emile told reporters in the US (via the DailyMail). “He’s a very good passer of the ball, his left foot is very good and he likes to create goals and score them himself.

‘I’ve already played against him at international level, so I can’t speak highly enough of him, and the fans should be really excited.

‘At the Euro Under-21s, they [Portugal] beat us 2-0 and he was unbelievable in that game.’

Considering both Emile and Fabio are likely to be in direct competition for the AM and wider roles, this is big praise indeed from the Englishman. Smith Rowe was amongst our best performers last term before suffering with Covid and injuries back in December, and he struggled to break back into the first-team amidst a rich vein of form for Gabriel Martinelli.

Competition are set to be even more fierce going into the new campaign, albeit with more competitions to share out the workload, and I’m certainly excited to see everybody get their chance, and Vieira certainly looks like he has every chance of making a big impact for our club.

I’m not sure likening him to Bernardo Silva is something that I would focus on too much, but he does seem suited to the way in which we like to play, and he should be more than able to fill in out wide or in behind the striker and be an asset for us.

Who do you think is most at risk of losing minutes to Vieira this season?

Patrick

Tags Emile Smith Rowe Fabio Vieira

2 Comments

  1. I am always tickled by the generally impossible to answer question(s) with which PATRICK finishes every article. I accept he is only trying to garner our comments and that is fair enough.

    But really Patrick, could you at least sometimes ask a question that we can answer with some hope of being accurate, instead of GUESSING?

  2. Slightly OT but does anyone else feel like ESR is being overlooked this off season by supporters and pundits? He had some fantastic moments last year, is still young and hasn’t come near his peak yet.

    Obviously needs to get over so injury issues but I’m surprised at how rarely he seems to be in the discussion about our key attacking player (as opposed to basically all our other young players)

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