Arsenal are currently thriving in the Premier League, but their slow start to the season meant there was revisionism around former manager Unai Emery.
Emery lasted 18 months at Arsenal after replacing the legendary Arsene Wenger, and whilst there were deeper problems within the club at the time, he was deservedly sacked with the Gunners languishing in mid-table in November 2019.
Mikel Arteta arrived shortly after, and has since won the FA Cup, helped Arsenal return to the Champions League, and rebuilt the squad into one which has challenged for the Premier League title.
Emery has taken Aston Villa to the top four for now, but poor recent results and performances have led to criticism over him. This comes after some, including Tony Adams, surprisingly claimed that Emery should have been given more time at the club, despite the job Arteta has done.
Where Unai Emery went wrong at Arsenal
Arsenal finished fifth in Emery’s full season in charge, and also reached the Europa League final, where they were humiliated by Chelsea.
Emery’s side often secured good results, going on a 22-match unbeaten run early on, but performances were sometimes dire, with his reactive style of management a far cry from the free-flowing nature of Wenger’s football.
Arsenal were closing in on a top-four spot in the run-in, but Emery continually chopped and changed his team, and Jamie Carragher has pointed out the mistakes he made.
“We’ve loved them (Aston Villa) this season, but it takes me a little bit back to when he was at Arsenal, in his full season. He gets a lot of criticism for that season, but actually, for a lot of it he was doing really well, but towards the end of the season, because they were in the Europa League they were in a great position and for the top 4, they just missed out,” he explained on Monday Night Football.
“He started changing his team, his personnel, changing formation, he did a lot of back three and a lot of back four at Arsenal, and in the end he ended up with nothing. They missed out on the Champions League and they lost the final to Chelsea.”
Why Unai Emery is being criticised now
Aston Villa suffered a humiliating defeat at home to Tottenham Hotspur, with Emery making some surprise formation and team selection changes as they are also balancing their progress in the Europa Conference League.
Their form is now nosediving, and the parallels between Villa now and Arsenal in 2019 are too close to ignore.
Emery’s failure at Arsenal was mostly self-inflicted: he took Arsenal away from their attacking style without the defence improving, and he threw away a near-guaranteed top-four spot whilst still failing in Europe.
Arteta has done a far superior job in fixing the mess left behind by Emery, and even if the Spaniard proves successful at Aston Villa, there is not a single bit of regret in North London that he was not given more time at the Emirates.
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