Every Arsenal fan is more than aware of the strange situation that has arisen since William Saliba’s arrival from St. Etienne last summer, with Mikel Arteta refusing to even put him in Arsenal’s Europa League side.
The fact is that Saliba hadn’t played football for six months upon his arrival, and Arteta obviously thought he wasn’t ready, but ever since Saliba was sent back to France to join Nice on loan, he seems to be doing very little but talking about how Arteta didn’t give him a chance.
His latest interview on RMC’s ‘Top of the Foot’ show (as transcribed by the Mirror) has Saliba criticising Arteta once again: “It is clear that so much has changed in the last year. When I saw that the coach changed a lot changed for me too.
“In this year there has been a lot of change. He judged me on two-and-a-half matches. I would have liked for him to play me more. But he told me I wasn’t ready.
“I was waiting for him to give me a chance, but football is like that.
“When I initially came to Arsenal the league looked very good so I showed up to training and wanted to train on my own to show the coach I was ready.
“I am happy now, I want to play for Nice. The idea when you’re part of a team is a better feeling for me.”
Arteta has already been given a lot of flak and even agreed that he should have put Saliba in the Europa League squad, but Arteta did not publicly criticize Saliba (say for not learning English after a year {fact} or staying fit in lockdown {my guess] and the fans were kept in the dark about the whole situation until Arteta explained when Saliba went on loan: “We signed a big project that we had some issues with because he hasn’t played enough football in the last eighteen months.
“At that age and in the development phase he is at, that is crucial.
“And I was very conscious when he came back, when he didn’t do the step that he had to do before joining us that to start a relationship with a new manager, with a new club, with new team-mates in a situation where he is not having any game time it’s really difficult and I think it’s really damaging for the future.”
But Saliba has gone completely the other way and is criticizing Arteta every chance he gets. That is not acting like a professional (who is still employed by Arsenal) and Mikel Arteta is not likely to respond to the youngster’s utterances in public, which is as it should be.
Should Saliba just shut up and simply doing his talking on the pitch?