Mikel Arteta has conceded his long-term future at Arsenal is dependent on winning silverware as he prepares to celebrate his sixth anniversary in charge.
The Spaniard was appointed on 20 December 2019 and led Arsenal to the FA Cup a few months later but that remains his only major trophy since replacing Unai Emery. Arteta will mark six years in the job against his former club Everton on Saturday night – the same opponents Arsenal faced a day after he was announced as their manager. He watched that game from the stands before officially beginning his role the next day.
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With second-placed Manchester City facing West Ham in a 3pm kick off and trailing by two points, Arsenal could be knocked off the top of the Premier League table for the first time since mid-October before their game begins. Arteta has 18 months on the contract extension he signed in 2024 but is aware he must deliver sooner rather than later.
He said when asked whether he could imagine himself staying beyond 2027: “Yes, but it’s about today. And a lot of things have to happen in the next few months as well to earn the right. I think a manager has to earn the right to be here tomorrow. And that’s how you react, how you talk here, how you go in the dressing room, the message that you send, how much the players follow you. I always say that you need support. I said it before, from ownership and the board is great.”
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Arteta added: “At the end, the most important one is those players. You open that door, you confront them, you talk to them … And for six years, I’ve seen just players with a level of attention, desire to learn and give the maximum to the team. That is what it gives me in this job. Nothing else. And obviously winning a lot of football matches, that percentage-wise I think is quite high. So that’s the only way. If not, you cannot survive in this environment.”
Despite a dramatic late victory over Wolves in their most recent match and presiding over a squad that has sustained more than 100 injuries since the start of last season, Arteta barely seems to have aged since taking his first senior managerial role. Ben White is the latest absentee, ruled out with a hamstring injury expected to sideline him for a few weeks.
Arteta believes the “priorities and messaging” are very different to the day he arrived and is confident Arsenal are close to finally achieving their objective.
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“You look at the performances, all the records that we had that they were breaking in the history of the club …” he said. “We still haven’t managed to do that [win trophies]. But that tells you the level that we are in, which is a level that the Premier League has never experienced in the past. And that we want to achieve even higher goals. And if we do that, I think we are on the right path to winning.”