Arsenal boss Mikel Arteta faced the media ahead of his side’s trip to Greece to face Olympiacos in the next round of the Europa League.
Winning the competition seems like our only hope of making this season a successful one. Arsenal need to go all out in the Europa league and Arteta has to get his selection right in every single game.
Arsenal brought in Martin Odegaard in January to help us go all the way in the Europa League. The Norwegian is yet to register a goal or an assist, but he been really impressive at times, and Arteta is absolutely delighted with him.
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The Gunners boss labelled his behaviour, attitude and work rate as phenomenal, and claimed that he has had better moments in games than many of his teammates.
Arteta said, as per Arsenal.com: “I’m really happy with him. I think he’s settled really, really quickly into the team and with what we demand from the players.
“His behaviour, his attitude and his work rate has been phenomenal. He’s had better moments than others to give us the special qualities he has, but overall I’m really happy with him.”
Will Odegaard start against Olympiacos?
From what we saw last season, Olympiacos will sit back and try to hit us on the counter-attack. Arsenal struggled to break their defence down in the second-leg – even with Mesut Ozil playing the full 120 minutes.
Arsenal will need all the creativity in the world to break down this well-drilled Olympiacos side and Odegaard is definitely the man to turn to.
The Norwegian has incredible vision and his movement creates space for the players around him. It’s never ideal to start him and Smith Rowe together as it takes away pace on one of the wings.
However, if there’s one game where where the pair can work brilliantly, it’s the one against Olympiacos in Greece tomorrow.
