Arsenal have taken a supreme gamble appointing Mikel Arteta – should the new man fail, few will be surprised
HAD Mikel Arteta been a football genius, Manchester City would have anointed him as Pep Guardiola’s successor.
As SunSport reported last week, the Premier League champions refused to do so.
Had Arsenal’s board been certain Arteta was the right man for the job, they’d have appointed him when Arsene Wenger left 18 months ago.
They did not. They were convinced Unai Emery was the perfect fit, as we were told by a smug chief executive Ivan Gazidis — who promptly hopped it to AC Milan, the seven-time European champions he has guided into the bottom half of Serie A.
Had Arsenal wanted a battle-hardened, over-achieving Premier League boss, they would have approached Mauricio Pochettino — who has indicated he would have crossed the North London divide.
Was Poch making mischief? Probably not. The Argentine is enough of a rotter to have relished such a challenge.
SHOT IN THE DARK
Had Arsenal instead followed the recent trend and opted for a heart-strings appointment of a club legend, the Gunners could have plucked Patrick Vieira from Nice.
Arteta is a former Arsenal captain but his five-year stint at the Emirates does not compare to Frank Lampard’s standing as Chelsea’s all-time record scorer.
Nor Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s status as the scorer of Manchester United’s most famous goal.
So he does not even have sufficient clout to act as a human shield to the disastrous Kroenke ownership of London’s grandest club.
Arsenal’s angry mob will feel little sentimentality towards Arteta, should he continue the club’s long-term downward trajectory.
The appointment of the Spaniard, 37, with no previous managerial experience, represents a shot in the dark almost unprecedented at a major English club.
Or perhaps it is an admission that the Arsenal aren’t all that major any more.
When Arteta enters the visitors’ dugout at Bournemouth on Boxing Day, the man with the Lego hairdo will have much to prove at a divided club, NINE points off the Champions League places with just five League wins.
Indeed, Arteta ought to have been in situ for Saturday’s trip to Everton. Arsenal were in no position for chin-stroking procrastination from the posh seats.
Unlike Everton’s Duncan Ferguson, caretaker Freddie Ljungberg had failed to produce any upturn.
Arteta’s opening home games against Lampard’s Chelsea and Solskjaer’s United represent serious tests in front of that fractious support base.
Fail to hit the ground running and Arsenal will be deep in the bottom half.
Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, the captain whose goals have carried the team, is in no mood to extend his contract.
Mesut Ozil is a maddening enigma, Granit Xhaka on his way out and the defence is a long-term omnishambles.
Arteta’s introductory press conference suggested Guardiola’s former assistant is realistic enough about the problems he faces and has vowed to be ‘ruthless’ in shaking up a failing squad.
The Spaniard was earmarked as a future manager while an Arsenal player, due to his natural authority and footballing intelligence.
He was not popular with many Arsenal team-mates, due to his busy demeanour, yet that is seen as a positive by the board.
LACK THE KUDOS OF KOP AND UTD
Still, appointing Arteta before he has managed elsewhere represents a supreme gamble. Many a well-respected No 2 has failed to make the step up.
Arteta concedes that turning around Arsenal is a long-term project but should they slide out of Europe altogether, as looks very possible, their ability to attract high-quality imports will recede.
Having never won a European Cup, they do not enjoy the same kudos abroad as United or Liverpool.
And whatever his strengths, Arteta is not the sort of stellar name players would be desperate to work under.
Everton’s Carlo Ancelotti, who was keen on the Gunners job himself, has far greater pulling power.
So this is a supreme punt on a good bloke, with the raw qualities of brightness and desire, and little else.
Should Arteta prove a roaring success, Arsenal will have shown uncommon prescience.
Should he fail to unite a broken club, few will be surprised
GIVE KEV TOP GONG
KEVIN DE BRUYNE’S performance against Leicester was as gorgeous a midfield exhibition as you’ll see all season.
The Belgian anticipates runs which haven’t yet been made, imag-ines angles which defy geometry and uses a football as an artist’s tool.
Had he been born in the 15th century, he’d have probably conceptualised flying machines and painted the Mona Lisa.
Since joining Manchester City in 2015, De Bruyne (right) has been the Premier League’s outstanding talent and already has ten assists to his name before the halfway stage of this campaign.
Yet like his visionary forerunner Paul Scholes, De Bruyne has never won a Footballer of the Year or PFA Player of the Year award.
He has only once made the PFA Team of the Season, for which Scholes was included just twice.
However dominant Liverpool are, De Bruyne deserves individual recognition this term.
WE'RE UP FRONT
FOUR of the Premier League’s five leading scorers are English.
They are Jamie Vardy, Tammy Abraham, a born-again Danny Ings at Southampton and Marcus Rashford.
You would have to go back 20 years to find natives dominating the scoring chart to this extent — when Kevin Phillips, Alan Shearer, Andy Cole and the largely-forgotten Michael Bridges made the top five.
Gareth Southgate is spoilt for choice, yet he should still try twisting Vardy’s arm about an international comeback for Euro 2020.
WORLD FARCE
FORGIVE us that we have not got too carried away with Liverpool’s new-found status as ‘world champions’.
They were always likely to reach the World Club Cup Final, given competition against teams from Mexico, Tunisia, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the Pacific islands of New Caledonia, where Robinson Crusoe probably plays up top.
Flamengo, of Brazil, gave them a game in the final but, given that around 90 per cent of South America’s best players play in Europe, defeating them was no great feat either.
This event was an unnecessary intrusion on a congested season.
ROOT IS ON THE OTHER FOOT
ENGLAND start a four-Test series against South Africa on Boxing Day — and their hosts are in even worse shape than Joe Root’s side.
The Proteas have called on their successful recent past by appointing the great Jacques Kallis as batting consultant, beneath Mark Boucher as head coach and former run-machine skipper Graeme Smith as director of cricket.
So basically England face a team which will struggle to beat their own coaching staff.
PETERS HAD X FACTOR
IT broke the heart of Jimmy Greaves when Tottenham swapped him for West Ham’s Martin Peters in 1970.
Yet the great Greaves always said that if you were to single out one player who gave England’s 1966 World Cup winners the X factor, it would be Peters.
Peters’ death at 76 was a sad loss to English football. Our thoughts are with his loved ones this Christmas.
OLE'S LOW-DOWN
BEAT the lower teams in the Premier League while losing to the big boys, and you can say your squad is short of quality.
But defeat the best and lose to the worst — as Manchester United consistently do — and the finger points straight back at a manager, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, failing to instil sufficient fight into an underachieving team.
ROCK OF ALL AGES
THE ground-breaking wins by Fallon Sherrock at the World Darts Championship are heartening but there is no reason why women shouldn’t compete on equal terms at the oche.
Pretty soon, similar feats will not look out of the ordinary.
So this is a supreme punt on a good bloke, with the raw qualities of brightness and desire, and little else.
Should Arteta prove a roaring success, Arsenal will have shown uncommon prescience.
Should he fail to unite a broken club, few will be surprised.