Granit Xhaka was one of the happiest players to see Mikel Arteta arrive at Arsenal in December 2019.
Weeks before the Spaniard’s arrival, Xhaka was involved in a huge fallout with Arsenal fans, resulting in the midfielder being stripped of captaincy.
It’s since been revealed that if it weren’t for Arteta’s presence, Xhaka would’ve left the club, admitting his bags were packed, ready for the exit.
That’s one of the reasons why the Arsenal manager’s arrival was so memorable for the now Sunderland star, as he can still recount the boss’s first actions at Colney.
Granit Xhaka reveals the first thing Mikel Arteta said to the squad after becoming Arsenal manager
Xhaka was named in Arteta’s first-ever Arsenal starting XI and was quickly influenced by the manager.
In an interview with The Athletic, the 33-year-old opened up about what happened when Arteta first addressed the squad he’d inherited from Unai Emery.
“I will never forget the first day Mikel came in,” Xhaka said, setting the scene of what unfolded at Colney.
“At the training ground, we had a big room and there were some chairs in there, but the chairs were everywhere, chaos.
“He took all the people who were working in the building into this room and said, ‘Guys, from the outside, you look like this. Chaos’. So everyone takes a chair and puts it in the right place, and he says: ‘I want you to be like this every day’.”
Arteta has deployed some bold tactics away from the pitch to get his team performing at a higher level, something that was implemented as soon as he stepped through the door.
Immediately, Arteta won over Xhaka, who was blown away by the standards shown, describing working with the boss as ‘unbelievable’.
“You think ‘wow’, he’s started already with these standards — the first day. After that, he was building our mentality, standards in training, pre-training, activation, recovery.
“He brought people in who did a great job. It was unbelievable to work with him because he saw football in a different way.”
Arteta has never shied away from going above and beyond to get his point across to his players, and love it or hate it, it certainly works.
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It’s not just set-piece training that goes down at Colney, as from pickpockets to RAF pilots, it’s impossible to predict what the Arsenal boss will unleash next.
Here are five examples of Arteta stepping outside of the norms of coaching to get the best out of his team.
- Hired pickpockets to show the importance of being ready, alert and prepared.
- Showed Ivan Toney’s social media post about Arsenal in the dressing room before playing Brentford.
- Played You’ll Never Walk Alone in training before Arsenal played Liverpool at Anfield.
- Introduced Win the dog at Colney to promote a family atmosphere, improve player morale and reduce stress levels.
- Plotted to bring in RAF pilots to improve communications.
There aren’t any managers quite like Arteta, but Arsenal wouldn’t change him for the world.
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