Arsenal sacked Unai Emery and replaced him with Mikel Arteta at the start of the 2019/2020 season.
Emery had led us to the final of the Europa League in his first season, but that second campaign didn’t look like it was going to plan at the time.
The club acted swiftly and brought in Arteta to arrest the slide.
Before he joined the Gunners, he was the assistant manager to Pep Guardiola at Manchester City.
That was the closest Arteta came to having a senior managerial job before we trusted him with our club.
The Spaniard is now set to lead us in his second full season at the helm and one constant thing about his time is the selling of players.
Arteta would have sold more than 80% of the players he met at the club if all the stars linked with a move away leave.
Every time we are told that he is “rebuilding” the squad and one wonders how long it will take.
I’m curious, if Arteta is trying to sell almost everyone before he can bring lasting success to the club, why didn’t we keep Emery and sell most of these players too?
The Spaniard had asked for Wilfried Zaha and got Nicolas Pepe, but Arteta wanted Thomas Partey and got the Ghanaian.
Logic says we should have backed the more experienced manager, but we have decided to trust an inexperienced Arteta and it feels like the club will keep him on for a long time because he looks like a romantic appointee.
An article from Ime
It’s honesty it’s difficult to tell. I think another manager could do fairly well with the current squad. Yes we do still need to clear our a few players but our “1st choice” say 14 players really aren’t as bad as 8th place.
Keep in mind that MA has learnt from Pep that has only ever had some of the best squads on the planet and/or near unlimited funds to work with. Arsenal is completely different so who knows.
Arteta wants his own players anyone who was not brought by Arteta look out
Arteta himself was not a great player and now he believes himself to be the greatest coach
Mourinho never kicked a professional ball; can you tell us the number of champion league trophies under his belt? How many trophies did Maradona MHSRIP win? What about the outgoing Bayern Munich coach Hans Frick,; do you remember him in any professional club as a player? Just be level headed in your critiisms!
Both are or was good enough ,in this mess because of the pair of them ,Arteta struggling to get rid of the players bought it while Emery was in charge and now the club are going to throw money at Arteta in the hope he can turn it around which must fans realise he probably won’t do .
not good enough *
By the time Emery was sacked almost the entire dressing room was against him and also he had a communication problem… At least this is what we were led to believe…..Arteta on the other hand still has the support of majority of the squad especially the youngsters who are key to our future despite a poor season
He has support of the majority of the squad and yet finished 8th. This says a lot about his capabilities.
The players support him cause they know he’s soft and they don’t have to work hard to get better.
Why was “almost the entire dressing room against him”. Could it have been that he tried to push these pampered overpaid so called “professional” footballing prima donnas out of their comfort zones make them train, turn up for games and fight for their personal pride and the badge?
I believe we have massively under achieved with this squad. On paper no one can say we have less of a squad then licester, west ham etc etc. We have much better squad then them and should have finished in top 4. Remember we added a lot of players after Emery as well in form of Willian, Gabi, Partey and Cedric along with I believe Saliba and Tierney should be added to this list as well because although they were signed previous year when UE was incharge but they really came into the team this year Tierney being absent because of injuries and hardly available to UE and Saliba out on loan to join us next season. So over all Arteta squad was way improved and much better then UE squad but this logic by some people here that Arteta was not supported by Kronke in transfer market is nonsense. It’s just Arteta has failed and under achieved massively…actually achieved nothing. I would not have kept both the managers for poor showing but if one was to be kept and given more time then that should have been UE not Mr fake Pep. Problem with Arsenal board has always been they never accept they made a mistake and try to rectify it instead they try to make it stick and work. Which causes more damage then the original mistake would have done if they would have just accepted and moved on to a new solution.
Your write-up on Arsenal status to date is worth comments. Your factual information has been well captured. I need not add or repeat what you have said but I feel I have to add that as long as the Board wants to keep Arteta just because he was assistant to Pep, then it’s the board which is frantically looking for ways of reducing Arsenal to a mere spectator as far as première league is concerned. With Arteta as the undisputed coach of the great Arsenal, we must be preparing ourselves for relegation. There is no logic in selling almost the whole squad hoping for miracles. If Arteta cannot work with any senior players, then let him be coach of under 21. Which highly rated players from any recognised league would be longing to work under Arteta? NONE. The longer he is kept as Arsenal senior team coach or manager the nearer we are moving towards relegation. Let the board be brave enough and accept they made a mistake and correct it by hiring a coach that can take Arsenal forward. Arteta is not good enough for what Arsenal stands for.
Don’t forget that if AUBA had not missed that penalty Emery would still be here as we would have finished 4th
You righ towny , about Auba missing the penalty. I fully share your opinion.
Don’t you mean Xhaka giving the penalty away against Brighton
Any number of examples!
Agreed. That’s a well thought analysis.
Emery didn’t have Tierney,he barely played because of injury he already had sustained, Gabriel who is by far our best defender wasn’t here either, holding barely played also because of injury
He was 20+ games unbeaten with stoppers of the lowest quality like Sokratis, mustafi, luiz how many managers would have been able to do that with this piss poor quality in the back?
Unfortunately our fans have been so content with mediocrity that they don’t understand actual improvement.
The reality is emery achieved more in his first year than even Wenger on his last two.Just goes to show how essential a good manager is.
Arteta is not even a proper manager yet the fact he became arsenal coach is only because he played here once ( btw he wasn’t even an important player to begin with unlike solksjaer for example in United)
Emery after many years wanted the players to actually work to make a living and the players didn’t like that.
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I think UE was sacked because the majority fans already lost interest in him.
I think our apprentice is still keeping his job because of the empty stadium caused by the covid 19 pandemic.
If fans where allowed into the stadium next season and our apprentice fail to improve, he may not be lucky.
Emery was ABSOLUTELY the problem. The fact that Arteta has turned out to be a near-unmitigated disaster as a Manager does not absolve Emery of his failures.
That Arsenal went out and managed to get themselves a worse manager instead of a better one, does not suddenly mean Emery was not the problem.
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Couldn’t have said it better .
Emery was not the problem as I said if Auba had not missed that penalty we were 4th
I disagree that Arteta is a worse manager than Emery.
Arteta has clearly not been a disaster.
Emery had his problems getting the best out the squad he had. Whether he would have been able to turn it around is uncertain. It was clear that many people had turned against him effectively making his position untenable.
There have been problems with the Arsenal squad for years. Attempts have recently been made to correct some of them but there is way to go yet. When these are addressed and Arteta has had enough time to work with the squad we will be better able to assess his work.
He had worse roster than arteta and he got to uel final and almost made it to champions League,we didn’t make it clearly because during the last games individual performances were awful by certain players.
Emery is a good manager and he’s been proving that for a long time.
Emery is a quality manager that had issues
with the collective cancer that existed in
the locker rooms of both PSG and Arsenal
a the time of his respected tenures. Sure the
Spaniard had his issues but the likes of
Neymar, Dimaria, Verotti, Ozil, Sanchez, etc
were complicit in turning there locker room
against Emery. Arsenal were more than
capable of making the top 4 in his first
season but the PLAYERS bottled it plain
and simple.
Emery still managed to win 8 from 9 domestic trophies with PSG and had a higher win percentage than Blanc, Ancellotti, Tuchel and Ponchettino, but like them failed to win the Champions League.
Good stats Ozzie but UE, much like the names you
listed were brought in to the Paris club to win CL
silverware not domestic titles. I’m sure both TT and
UE would have a few choice “Off The Record” words
to say about certain cancers in the PSG locker room.
ACE, you can add Ponchettino to that list too, who didn’t win as much as Emery, but also had problems with players taking issues directly to Leonardo or the owners of PSG.
Was Emery not the problem?
Yes but he was not the solution either.
You can’t solve anything if the Board and senior management don’t support you.
Unai emery’s exit from Arsenal I think was actually caused by decrease in the number of fans in stadium on match days. Although, we’ve been hearing some rumour he was going to be sacked but you and I know Arsenal ain’t the type of club who sacks coaches anyhow.
I remembered telling a fellow Arsenal fan that the problem then has nothing to do with the coach but those deadwoods(players). And now that Unai Emery has done the masterclass by winning the Europa league with an average team it can be said that his failure at Arsenal was never his fault.
He has done brilliant work winning the EL. I admire him for his achievements and certainly have respect for that and his efforts to speak English. He might have been better using an interpreter until his skills improved but that is water under the bridge. I would love someone to explain to me how Arsenal went down the pan that season. An almost nailed on CL spot and an embarrassing defeat in Baku with a bunch of players deciding to take the man down. Who was to blame? A manager that could not control the senior players or those senior players not respecting Emery or the club?
As for Arteta- he was a gamble and he has a short period of time next season to overcome his inexperience or Kroenke will have a riot of sorts on his hands. Arteta did though get rid of some players I’m glad to see the back of.
Steve Bruce is supposedly a poor manager, yet under his management Arsenal loanee Joe Willock scored 8 goals in 8 games for Newcastle United against the same opposition Arsenal plays against. These 8 goals are more than all Arsenal midfielders under Arteta have scored together in one and a half seasons.
Ozzie, how many goals Joe scored under Emery, both Arteta And Emery are not good for Arsenal
Dunchirado, from information available Joe Willock scored 6 goals in 15 appearances by the end of Emery’s tenure. Emery gave him his chance and saw him as an Ramsey/Wiltshire replacement. Emery was sacked a month later.
The problem is not the coach but time that is given
Stats don’t lie
Arteta is not the type of Coach Arsenal should get if they are Ambitious. You brought an apprentice who is learning/inexperienced and you expect result. I doubt if we will not continue to regress as long as he remains in charge.
The big difference in my opinion is that when Emery was manager there were fans in the stadium venting their spleen but none for this season when Arteta has been the boss. Makes a big difference imho..
Emery has expeeience as a coach he manager a average team like villareal nd won europa his a good coach.arsenal should have given him time cause he wouldve done well.
A point well made
I wonder if the crowd showing displeasure would have got Arteta the sack and yet bring another new managerial appointment. I’m not sure if the Watford example is one Arsenal should follow but neither is pursuing with the wrong man. Difficult decisions
Persisting
Spot on,Declan
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Great point. They’ve been a failing squad for years under AW and UE. Problems compounded by poor recruitment too.
Chickens all came home to roost!
👍 The mental and physical strength in the players recruited has seemed away.
“seeped away”
Nerve wrecking with all those shots on our goal under Emery, it was madness the amount of shots every team was getting. He said it himself, he’d rather win 3 – 2 or 4 – 3 over a 1 – 0, shows his lack of desire for a well balanced team imo -for even comparing attack v defense outcomes. He also likes an underdog tag and loves cup competition as you all well know.
Arteta was afforded time in beginning to sort defensive issues out and clear some room in the squad. One of the guys in here talked about his main challenge now being ..Can he get our attack to improve their numbers, or can he get the correct recruits to work them in his favor.
This makes no sense, when Emery came our primary problem was the defense and instead of fixing that he brought Sokratis and David Luiz (“multiple red cards and penalties” David Luiz). He also didn’t push for players like Mustafi or Kola to be sold when we knew they weren’t good enough. Also Arteta wanted Aouar too and did not get it (and I also believe he wanted him first before Partey). Also the amount of goals and shots all the teams were getting with Emery was insane, luckily for him Auba was in form at that time and saved many many games we played terrible. Also, Torreira as a 10 (smh). I think Emery was never a good fit for Arsenal, he seems to prefer to play more as a small team (Sevilla, Villareal), not as a big one (PSG, AFC). Even after all of that, both Emery and Arteta are good coaches, both were and are being let down by the club. With some luck that’ll stop in the next transfer window.