Arsenal boss Mikel Arteta on the crucial Premier League clash with Manchester United and the title race
Sobha Realty Training Centre, London Colney, UK
Sobha Realty Training Centre, London Colney, UK
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00:00 We saw you training yesterday, there was no Tomi Asu and Saka had a bit of a heavy strapping, is everyone alright? Is everyone fit to go?
00:15 Yeah, a few doubts. Tomorrow we can resolve because we have another training session. So we'll have to wait and see.
00:22 Doubts over?
00:24 A few names that you discussed.
00:27 Jorginho said yesterday you were going to leave it as a short-term contract. I wonder how important he is to you, with what you're trying to do this season but obviously going forward to next season. And if he needed any persuasion at all?
00:49 I think there's no questions about his contribution to the team. The way he feels about his team-mates, about the club, the way we play. He's someone that makes everybody else better. That's his main quality. He's still hungry, he wants to win, he wants to win with us. He's happy here, his family's happy here. So for us it was a really easy decision.
01:16 You know he's a little bit like your eyes and ears on the field. Anybody that's watched you live can see the input he has, from almost like a coaching point of view. Is there a bit of him that maybe reminds you of yourself then?
01:31 He's a very important player for all the coaches I think because his game understanding, the way he communicates, the way he coaches people is excellent. You need those type of players but on top of that I think as a model. Very difficult to find somebody better than him. When he needs to be at it and serious and drag people with him he does it. When it's fun and relaxing atmosphere he's one of the best as well. It's a good combination.
02:00 If I'd said to you at the beginning of the season, two games to go, you'd be right in a title race. Win your last two games and the title could be yours. What would you have said?
02:13 I would have taken that pen and signed it.
02:19 We know it might not work out the way you want it. Can you give us a sense that if you have done that and you sign that pen and win your next two games, the sense of crushing frustration, disappointment or is it one of belief and joy because you're right where you wanted to be?
02:46 My brain always took me to the place where we are lifting the Premier League. That's what my brain is doing at the moment. I just follow my brain and my gut and this is how I feel and this is the way I want everybody to think. Hopefully we can achieve it.
03:01 Arsenal fans picked up their papers the other morning and saw Fulham doing some kite flying and they were a little bit concerned that the Premier League title might be over. I wondered what you made of that and the idea of bonding. I guess the best thing you've done with this group of players to bond them and I suspect it's probably not kite flying.
03:30 The power of team bonding. Nobody knows what it is but sometimes you get amazing results with it. I've been in teams where we have a story to win a game and go out for dinner and do an activity and then it's an unbelievable run. Again I'm very positive that's going to happen to Fulham.
03:49 Do you remember your best bonding? There was a phase of army training and co-steering and just hideous sounding things like that. Do you remember a moment that stuck out as a group, as a team?
03:58 We've done a few. We've done trips with David Moyes. He used to take us around the US and one of the best I've ever had in my life.
04:07 Is it tough psychologically to not be in control of the title outcome? How do you manage that with the players?
04:20 It leaves you in a very clear situation where you have to focus and be determined to do what you have to do to be in the best possible position. That's very simple and clear and that's what we are doing.
04:32 Do you make sure the players know that it might not work? Do you have to prepare them for that possible outcome as well?
04:40 No, we have to think that it is going to work and what is going to work is that we try to be better than our opponents and beat them. The final outcome will be something else that at the moment is not in our control.
04:53 Manchester United aren't in the greatest of forms. We saw that at Selvers Park. Does that count in this game or do you think it's the fixture where you take the form out of the equation?
05:05 I don't think about every game has a different context. We know the difficulty is in our history when you look at what we've done over there. We're going to have to be at our best to end the right to win the game.
05:18 You don't have the greatest of records at Old Trafford, well Arsenal don't anyway. Does it make it even more challenging to prepare that game knowing you must win in this context?
05:29 It is and we know what we need to do but first of all we have to perform at a really high level to the Serbs to win the match and that's where the focus is.
05:37 Will you be training when the City game is on?
05:45 We're going to be training.
05:46 Anyone giving you the updates or you're just not interested?
05:49 I don't know. I don't know if it's something we can control but I'm sure people will be connected to it.
05:55 It's two years now you've gone head to head with what a lot of people consider, yourself included, the best team in the world. What does that say about you and the fact that it is two years, it isn't just a one-off?
06:07 Yeah, that we are in the journey to try to catch them and try to be better than them which is the aim and what we have to do. It is an inspiration to have this level of opposition and that's what makes you better, always when someone challenges you to go further and further.
06:23 The proof of how difficult it is to beat them is when you look at someone like Jürgen Klopp who leaves Liverpool in summer and he's only managed to win one Premier League title. That in itself tells you just how difficult it is to beat City doesn't it?
06:35 Yeah and obviously the history of City, before that as well they were winning trophies and they were winning Premier League and they've been in an unbelievable journey in the last 10-15 years.
06:45 But yeah we want to change that. We're trying to do everything that we can to improve and get better and better.
06:52 You spoke a lot about going to Anfield and it being like a washing machine and the difficulty of the atmosphere there. I just wonder if you hold Old Trafford on a similar par?
07:02 Well it is different but yeah obviously the difficulties there, the quality of the opposition, the quality of the individuals, the manager. It brings a lot of challenges so as I said we've been in very difficult decisions. We've done very well and hopefully we can do the same on Sunday.
07:20 Do you have any personal memories of difficult times you've had at Old Trafford?
07:27 I don't know. I think now we are preparing the game and trying to visualise the game that we're going to have to play on Sunday and we put ourselves in a really positive context. That's what we try to do.
07:38 I know you've won a lot of teams in the past but the reverse fixture obviously carries some fantastic memories. I just wonder what your memories of the dramatic win earlier in the season?
07:46 Yeah it was a game with a lot of alternatives. A difficult one. There were small margins because they had a huge moment when the goal was disallowed and it was a 1-2. Then we turned the game around and scored two very good goals. That tells you the difficulty, the quality of them and what we're going to have to do to beat them.
08:05 Are you sympathetic with Eric Teng-Hart's decision to turn the game around?
08:17 Yeah for sure because at this level that's the reality. The margins are so small and momentum shifts in relation to an action sometimes in the game, sometimes in a season because you need that momentum to something click and then start an unbelievable round. So of course I do.
08:33 How important is signing Jorginho for the team?
08:48 First of all as a player on the pitch because he's a phenomenal player and he gives so much. Then for the rest of the qualities he has to bring to the team, to the squad, to the club, to our culture. We are delighted to have him.
09:04 Is he quite an effective character to have around the dressing room?
09:07 Impossible not to like him in any way. He's a super special person, a great family man with a lot of experiences. He knows how to talk to people, he knows how to inspire people and certainly he knows very well how to drive a team and be part of a really important team.
09:31 How would you describe your emotions now?
09:40 Focus. Focus on what we have to do, determined to do what we have to do and at the same time very enthusiastic and exciting and enjoying the moment.
09:53 Where do you visualise City dropping points?
10:08 That's something that's not in our hands. I'm telling you how I'm feeling, the thoughts that come to my head and what is driving my energy and my purpose right now is that ambition and that objective that is so good.
10:24 How do you keep from getting too high and too low at this stage of the season emotionally?
10:28 Being focused and determined in what we have to do is the only thing we can do, which is a lot because there's still a lot to play for against very difficult opponents and we know the turns that can happen in this league and you just have to look at the history of this league.
10:45 Last April Arsenal fell away in the title race, this time around you've made it to the end and you bank in contention. In terms of, for example, Paul Merson recently said he compared Man City to a prime Mike Tyson. Do you feel like that in some ways?
11:13 You have to keep improving and try to be better than them when you face them head to head and in a long, long, long season with a lot of demands in this league. It's what we know and this season maybe it's not been as high as we already expected because I think as well the league has gone to a different level this league, something I haven't seen before in my opinion but that's where we are.
11:38 With managers and refereeing decisions, with Eric Tonhagy expected after the game for him to be a bit upset possibly because his team lost, but obviously he's brought up a few times this season. Do you think that gives United and his team a bit of motivation to try and salvage something or get something against yourselves this weekend?
11:55 I don't know. I don't know how they are feeling about this but we have enough to think about how we're going to beat them and what we have to beat to be better than them.
12:06 There are a couple of people at Fulham that you'll know well, Leno and Willian, have you had any words with them this week?
12:13 No, no.
12:14 Not at all?
12:15 No.
12:16 You look back to that game in 2020, the first one at Old Trafford in so many years. You look at that squad now, there's four players remaining at Arsenal, there's nine at United. There's been managerial changes at United but you've been the front and centre for that whole period. I guess the speed of the evolution, does it surprise you at times when you look back at where you are now?
12:43 I don't know. It moves so fast and so many things happened daily that you don't tend to remember much about what happened three or four years ago. It's true that it's been an unbelievable journey in every sense with a lot of changes and we have come far from where we were, that's true, but there's still a lot to come.
13:08 You've used psychological tools, whether it's playing music or the lightbulb, it feels like now the record is so good against top six teams, do you feel that you as players can lead that now? You don't feel that you have to psych them up for a game?
13:22 Sometimes it's not related about lead or not lead, it's about moments, it's about trying to transmit certain ideas or bring an analogy to a situation that we want to face or provoke. But yeah, obviously the team now is differently prepared to a few years ago.
13:42 Thanks, we're now going to, that finishes the live section, we're now going to 10.30