Mikel Arteta has challenged himself and Bukayo Saka to work together to help the winger achieve even greater things after his incredible start to the campaign.
A brace and an assist against Monaco on Wednesday saw our home-grown product reach 21 goal involvements already this season, hitting the back of the net nine times and creating 12 more. Only seven players in Europe’s top five leagues have more, with Mohammed Salah the only Premier League star with a better output.
It goes to show the rarified level that Bukayo is playing at right now, but his manager believes there’s much more to get out of someone who is still only 23 years old, and is trying to carve out a plan to extract even more from the Hale End graduate.
“It is remarkable what he is doing consistently every three days in different competitions at this level, and he will continue to do that,” Mikel said. “He’s exceptional at what he does and he’s doing it very consistently. Now we need to go to the next step with things collectively as well to get that level. That’s the aim.
“We always set targets, but it’s about understanding how we’re going to reach those targets. If we have an idea to score 30 goals or 40, it’s about how we’re going to do it and then how we’re going to create a plan to try to develop the player to give him the best possible chance to make sure he’s able to do that.”
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It has been suggested that Bukayo could benefit by playing in a more central role, a move that allowed Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi to hit astronomical numbers in terms of goals after being freed up from defenders doubling up against them on the touchline. Mikel is not against the idea in the future if the stars align and it benefits the team in the long run.
Assessing that idea, he added: “I think that will depend a lot on the qualities and the players who are around him. For somebody to be an inside instead of an outside, somebody has to be outside and that player, that full-back, that attacking midfielder and nine has to allow the space to do that. But I’m certainly very open to keep evolving players.
“Sometimes it’s the role, sometimes it’s the position on the pitch and sometimes there are other things we can do so that he can spend more time in this position because when the ball is far on the opposite side, we can choose where we want him.”
For a number of years now, Bukayo has been the main man on the right flank while his partner in crime Gabriel Martinelli patrols the left wing in a different style. Mikel is pleased to have these two different variations to select from depending on each game, and feels that the pair are experienced enough to make their own decisions about swapping sides if need be without his instruction.
On the two options, he said: “It’s never going to be the same because they have different qualities. We need to understand that we have many other threats on our left side and over the years we’ve done it. If not, we wouldn’t be scoring the amount of goals that we have scored in the last two seasons, so I’m really pleased with that. Different is good, it doesn’t have to be symmetric. Asymmetrics in football are great and very difficult to combat.
“Their understanding of the game and spaces, and the timing that they move in relation to each other is strong. I think the freedom has to increase because the decision-making is going to improve because they understand it better, so that will create uncertainty in the opposition. At the moment they are in that stage where they have a lot more freedom than in the past.”
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