Mikel Arteta was full of praise for Martin Odegaard’s composure after the Norwegian helped haul Arsenal back from the brink of defeat to secure a 3-3 draw with West Ham at the London Stadium.
On an afternoon when the Gunners conceded three times inside 32 minutes, the 22-year-old midfielder provided his teammates with the ammunition they needed to bounce back against the odds.
The Real Madrid loanee twice fed Calum Chambers to make crosses that ended up in the back of the net via Tomas Soucek and Craig Dawson and went on to provide the pass that allowed substitute Nicolas Pepe to pick out Alex Lacazette for his late headed equaliser.
Odegaard ended the game with a 93% pass completion rate, including 37/41 passes in the final third, before getting the nod of approval from Arteta
“I think he had an incredible performance, he was very intelligent the way he read the game, the way he affected the game and again he showed how much he wants to win,” he said.
“When everyone was a little bit trembling, he gave us that composure on the ball and he created chance after chance.
“I love talented and creative players that all the time are willing to take that ball and make things happen, that are mobile and also hard-working. He is one of them.
“We have some others with different qualities but it’s true that Martin is now giving us a different level on certain things that we didn’t have.”
Arteta has also been impressed with the way the new boy commands his teammates to implement the high press.
“He’s been showing that from week one,” Arteta added. “When he steps on to that pitch, he always wants the ball.
“He commands the pressing and he’s been really influential. I think we are all happily surprised because he looks shy and humble but when he steps on that pitch, he is a real character. He loves to play football.”
Hope am wrong but don’t think he will be with us next year.
Me neither.
Not adding a signing-on clause was a big mistake. Withe these stellar performances he will either be called back to RM, or a moneybags club like City or Chelsea will snap him up. Stan won’t stump up the huge transfer fee that RM will demand.
BTW: I’ve just watched a very good Leicester City dump United out of the Cup. Which manger would YOU prefer to be running our club: Arteta or Brendan Rodgers?
I know which one I’d choose.
Arteta.
Firstly – RM probably turned down a signing on clause. They know he’s quality and just needs to click. It doesn’t have to be an Arsenal mistake.
Secondly – glad you’re enjoying watching Leicester city, they would be my ‘second team’ if there was room in my heart for one.
Did you still prefer Brendan to Arteta when we beat them not long ago? Have some faith and a bit of pride.
Stan signed off on £72 million for Pepe
€50 million for Partey at the beginning of a pandemic
KSE have shown in recent years that they are willing to invest
Woah there Rich, crazy horse. That money was ours, not theirs. Sure they may have green lit the deal, but its not actually their liquid cash. KSE haven’t invested a single penny in Arsenal since their involvement in the club. They only thing they have done is restructure the loan repayments on the stadium debt. That’s the reason we had the money for the Partey signing. We just had that money sitting there in a bank account we couldn’t use. Its Original purpose was as a safety net in case we failed to make the Champions League and consequently couldn’t… Read more »
I didn’t say they were willing to invest their own money
I said they were willing to invest
We’ve spent plenty of money, we’ve just not invested very well
I’m not here to sing praises to KSE. Far from it. But it doesn’t matter one bit what the structuring of the money was, they did it and spent it. They didn’t have to, but they did. “Our money”, “their money”, whatever we want to call it, when it’s their discretion to spend, it’s theirs, and they spent it on players.
Credit where it is due.
Credit it where its due? They did it because they quite literally had to do it. It wasn’t them doing us a solid.. They had to restructure those payments due to COVID. We weren’t earning any money as a club. The money sat in that bank account was the stadium debt relief fund. To clarify it was a contingency pocket of money locked away in case Arsenal failed to qualify for the Champions League, it was part of the loan agreements with the banks to finance the stadium build. However those reserves were only ever supposed to be a temporary… Read more »
You can argue about the details, but realistically are any owners really putting their own money in?
€50mill upfront for Partey
€30mill Gabriel
€80million Pepe
€30 million Saliba
€30million Tierney
€30mill Torreira
£56million Aubameyang
£50mill Lacazette
£35mill Xhaka
£35mill Mustafi
€20mill Perez
€25mill Leno
€20mill Sokratis
£170K p/w Mkhitaryan
£200k p/w Wilian
£350k p/w Ozil
£350k p/w Aubameyang
KSE have shown plenty of ambition in recent years, unfortunately they’ve backed incompetent people to make those investments
Well of course they are!! To mention a few Chelsea, City, Wolves.. Leicester, literally every single club in the league get investment from their ownership bar us. Swiss Ramble tweeted it recently that highlights KSE have never invested money into Arsenal, whereas everyone else is investing. So all of those players you’re referencing / player salaries were purchased with our money which belongs to the Arsenal. It has nothing to do with KSE. Ultimate they probably go ahead and say ‘yes, you can spend your money.’ But it isn’t theirs, and that is an extremely important fact to distinguish when… Read more »
RM wouldn’t have agreed to a purchase option though. They weren’t looking to sell him, they only loaned him because Odegaard told Zidane he wanted to go get game time.
Getting the deal done at all was a big coup, in my opinion – I can’t remember a loan player ever improving the team so much.
Would love it if we can keep him, but at the end of the day there’s other AMs we can target if not.
Is that the same Leicester we beat easily a few weeks ago? Just checking
Yeah, it’s the Leicester that are in a top-four place on a modest budget, while Arsenal, the third biggest club in England, are struggling to hold onto 10th place and are worse off than we were under Uni Emery.
We are a vastly superior side to the team under Emery. We have better players and Arteta just needs time to take us to the next level.
Please define what is meant by vastly superior, and how Arsenal achieved this “vastly superior” tag
I cringe at the bad bits and cheer and am overexcited with the good bits …..because the good bits are entertaining bits of skill and they are becoming more common and exciting.
some of the best bits of football I have seen Arsenal play since Sanchez and Ozil were strutting their stuff
For me Emery football was a chore and not really entertaining.
Anyway each to their own I am enjoying watching a team and manager grow and flourish (Hopefully 🙂 )
According to the latest Deloitte Football Money league report we are the sixth biggest club in England:
https://www2.deloitte.com/uk/en/pages/sports-business-group/articles/deloitte-football-money-league.html
Only Man United and Liverpool have won more titles than us. And only those two clubs have a bigger English fan base. We are the third biggest club in England.
I don’t want Rodgers at Arsenal but to ans your Q, yes it’s the same Leicester that are 3rd in the league currently.
It’s also the same Leicester who are achieving our main aim of mixing it with the money bag clubs.
Rogers is doing a great job with a team at least on half the wage bill of Arsenal. Where was Gabriel today? Why wasn’t Auba subbed earlier? I like Arteta, just think he should have got more experience before being given this role.
The start is on Arteta. That setup was bogus. Auba right? Saka left?! We couldn’t even get on the ball. The set a high press to prevent short goal kicks and pressed high and particularly fast against Xhaka, which limited his influence. He adjusted, but a bit slowly. Poor setup to start.
Why are people downvoting this comment?
Auba has never done well on the right. Why start him on the right again? And if Arteta has total faith in his decision, then why reverse the positions when we were at 2-0 down.
Keep the faith, and wait for the magic…but we know why the decision was reversed
I don’t understand the relationship between Aubameyang starting from the right and us entering the game the way we did.
Surely it didn’t make us lose concentration on their second. Also, once shifted left, Auba didn’t track Coufal for his cross into the box.
Umm, it wasn’t just that we were 2-0 down, it was that we were being dominated. We literally couldn’t get on the ball. Auba is poor in ball retention on the wings, and worse on the right. IMO as we have shifted to a more offensive team Auba makes little sense on the wing anymore.
Thought an Arteta side just recently beat and dominated a Brendan Rogers Leicester side recently.. but you know who’d you choose… and I thought cups didn’t mean anything. Recently watched one win us one dumping an even better City and Chelsea side out. You have a strange reactionary memory.
100 percent Rogers. Can’t believe how many down votes you got. Love our loyalty but I think Rogers would do a better job
I’ve said this so many times on here, but I kinda feel like it needs to be said again. I don’t think it really matters if we have Mikel, Brendan, Carlo or someone else. The one true consistent thing that has been here this whole time are this group of players. Wenger, Emery, Ljungberg, and Arteta have all pretty much got the same tune out of them bar a handful of points either way. Since Christmas, when we have been able to turf out a load of them (and there’s still loads to go I think) we have seen a… Read more »
what is this, Rodgers would do a better job story, give me a freaking break, the guy is a near guy, regardless of the win over United he will still lose the FA Cup, flop in the Europa League like he did, and finish off the top 4 like he failed last season and he will this season again. He’s good as a mid table manager. Arteta is doing well, it could be better but he’s doing ok, We get rid of Auba, Elneny, Ceballos, Willian, sale our young stars, AMN, Willock (he’s a talent but we can sale to… Read more »
LAME perpective as usual, literally no clue
My god just bore off
Arteta
But the insertion of a clause would only be possible if RM agreed – and they didn’t. I wonder why?
It appears the owner loaned the club the money to buy Partey so I guess that could happen again (although goodness knows how we’ll pay off these debts – the £120 million Govt. Covid loan is due in May).
I’m happy with the manager we have. Rodgers has had time to prove himself, I’m happy to do the same with our manager
Would you choose… Brendan Rogers?
Not fucking Brenda that’s for sure.
Arsenal. ..The catch and release stream
Let’s enjoy him while he us here. If he can help us win the EL, that would be reward enough. Who knows, that may enables us to afford him next year.
RM needs the money for Mbappe…and Zidane may stay on.. so u can never say never.
I think that’s more likely than him staying, although I hope I’m wrong. Real Madrid say they’ve no intention of selling him and his performances will hardly have changed their minds. Even if they did agree to sell him, those same performances are very likely to interest other clubs and his price will rise. There’s a limit to how far we can go and could we be outbid. That said, you never know so we’ll have to wait and see but just saying we should buy him doesn’t make it happen unfortunately.
Don’t praise him, it only puts the price up.
He was rubbish…
I’ve probably been less enthusiastic about MO than anyone to-date but today he was outstanding. Very impressive, motm for me easily. He keeps playing like that then yeah, buy him!
😂😂😂
Hahaa.
On a serious note, he played to that level once ESR was on the field for Xhaka. Not to bash Xhaka but I’ve always felt we’d get the best out of both MØ and ESR if they’re both played centrally. Sure seems like it’ll be leaky AF, but we conceded 3 in 30 minutes with a more conservative line up didn’t we?
Give’im 300k p/w and he’ll switch off just like Auba and you-know-who
Is it the Captain’s curse?
He was absolute rubbish. Real Madrid should cancel his contract.
Agree. Not only was he missing in attack, he was at fault for all 3 of our goals today and 2 of the goals that Manchester United conceded.
Imagine if Bergkamp and Henry (both playing poorly when we signed them) had instead been loans…they would have returned to their clubs much improved and probably stayed there.
What a shame we can’t sign players like Odegaard instead of loaning him. His value to Real Madrid is only increasing with each game. No chance of keeping him I fear.
Well they recalled him from a previous loan he performed well on and then decided not to play him much, only to loan him out to us. I think as long as Zidane is in charge his RM future is over. But that doesn’t mean we can afford him vs other big spenders we may need to compete with. I think that is why Arteta is putting on the charm offensive with him to hopefully convince him he belongs here instead of another RM type club stacked with talent that won’t have the same patience and build a team with… Read more »
Don’t be too pessimistic. He was tearing it up at Sociedad if you watch La Liga. His performances there was the main reason he was recalled – but to only be on the benched again. Which led him to Arsenal. His contract runs up until 2023, beyond this season there’s only 2 seasons left and it’s hard seeing him breaking thru the 1st team within this 2 seasons. So there’s hope!
Would it be unfair to suggest that the club is at a real crossroads if we dont get this over the line?
I hope so much we can sign him permanently, but presumably there is always a Plan B. I think we tried to sign Houssem Aouar and Julian Brandt earlier in the season, so it’s an area Arteta knows needs more quality.
If Madrid choose to keep Odegaard, we’ll have to sign someone else. Willock or Guendouzi just won’t cut the mustard if we’re serious about top 4 next season.
Not unfair, just a bit inaccurate
If Ødegaard becomes a gunner next season, we have a real chance of making top 4.
But that is a big IF!
I believe in miracles.
The boy is pure class.
I would say if we sign Odegaard we have a chance to make top 6. We still need another midfielder, a back up left back and possibly a back up GK.
Looking at this season, if he had been with us from the beginning, I am certain we’d be nothing short of 12 points more than the 42 we have at the moment. Some games in the D and L columns would be firmly in the W column. If we have him from the start of next season, having settled in nicely this season, we’d be up and running from day one. And if we get our defence sorted out, we’d be in the title mix. Make no mistake, Arsenal has about the most fluid attack in the EPL at the… Read more »
Ødegaard, Bissouma to partner Partey at the base, and VAR actually serving its purpose when Arsenal is concerned. Then I think top 4 isn’t too far fetched
Still can’t get my head around why Madrid let this guy go, as if they can’t use a player of his ability right now! Looks very much like the modern attacking midfielder, like a hard working Ozil that shoots.
Too right, by the end of his time here Ozil was practically allergic to shooting. I remember that goal he scored after a 20 pass move or so, he almost tried to miss from 2 yards and looked surprised when it went in off the GK, it was such a feeble effort. We have needed goals from midfield more than anything this season. Long live MO.
My biggest gripe with Ozil, beyond his work ethic, was his unwillingness to shoot and his subsequent goal return. Wasn’t as much of a problem when we had Sanchez, Ramsey and Walcott chipping in, but has always been an issue.
No.10s can sometimes get away with paltry scoring records, but modern AMs like Fernandes, KdB and Grealish all contribute, and it looks like Ødegaard may be cut from that same cloth.
He is the factor we are looking for. get him permanently
Maybe it’s time to find an excuse to put him on the bench just like all the other players that fans have high hopes about yet the manager sees differently and so calls upon the so called Experienced players that have let him down time and time again and are the reason why we’re in midtable. “Saliba, Martinelli, Smith Rowe(on the bench today, ‘when we should be about dominating teams according to the manager himself’), Pepe (able to come in because ‘the experienced’ Willian is injured). Holding and Gabriel because Luiz does no wrong as an experienced player even though… Read more »
Wonder if Real Madrid would consider a Odegaard / Auba swap.
Laca’s all round game is much better in the CF position.
if they were mad enough to do this we should bite their hand off.
That’s definitely crossed my mind.
Assume most people prefer our loan business with Real Madrid this season compared to the Bale deal? I prefer Odegaard & Ceballos than Bale for us. Before the North London Derby, I heard so much talk about the Bale deal being great.
Why would we want that smelly Spud in our team?
We wouldn’t – Some of the biased press etc just like to make it out as if we would have been better off with him!
He is such a baller this dude. We should have him deliberately play shit for the last three or four games so RM don’t want him back.
Sign him
Best Arsenal player since Cazorla
he remind me of cazorla a lot. such quick feet in tight spaces. reads the game so well and impossible to get the ball off him.
He plays like an interested Ozil, that also get’s stuck into challenges. We need this guy. Without him it’s 3-0. Chambers was a bloody weapon today too though. All of a sudden we have some RBs.
First order of business in the summer for the Club should be to sign this fellow up. 50million is bandied around as how much he would cost. A bargain if you ask me. Second order of business would be to get a proper midfield partner for Partey. Won’t fault Xhaka on effort and desire but he is so limited. He is supposed to be the more attacking of the two central midfielders at the midfield base but you couldn’t tell. He has high pass completion stats but those consist mostly of passes backwards and sideways. I don’t think opposition midfielders… Read more »
Ha.
Right. B/c the club has 100m just laying around.
Looks like yer club is the blue side of manchester.
I think he will be with us one more year. We are giving him game time, paying his wages, and letting him grow. He was amazing today in the final 3rd. Great game for Chambers too. I really didn’t fancy him starting, but credit to him, going forward he was great. Arteta needs to sort things out soon. We can’t keep giving goals away and switching off.
Come on Kroenkes, dig into your pockets and invest in this guy to become the creative heart of the next, stronger iteration of this team.
If Arsenal really want to progress, signing Odegaard permanently is absolutely essential.
Let’s hope we can do it.
I guess this was why he let Ozil go;
“I love talented and creative players that are, … mobile and also hard-working. He is one of them.”
Has got to be one of the best January loan signings we’ve made! Composed, smooth, and always looking forward – he is everything Arsenal should be looking to be!
He is on another level, I would love for him to join us permanently but Madrid, with their agreeing midfield, couldn’t be that stupid could they?
I doubt their midfield would agree to having him back and hence lose their place in the RM team.
Sign da ting Ode!!
Played well today second half. He reminds me of Ramsey. Very forward thinking, retains the ball well good decision making. Like the more direct lay offs from him with tight slide rule passes into the strikers from the middle and into the box. but also good lay offs to Chamber out right which he partnered with well. Whether we can sign him of course in summer up in the air because double jeopardy is if he plays well, a new regime at RM may keep him or hike prices to sell him to a CL club. He’s in front of… Read more »
MOTM for me today Laca Grabbed the bull by the balls. in the combat zone and very good tight control to keep getting shots off in box, goal being slightly fortuitous but result of constant effort. but like Odegaard also a string of excellent balls directly slideruled forward or played out to Chambers quickly. A great assist today and a well taken third goal. A bit unfortunate when he lofted the ball over Fabianski but it was cleared off the line. As mentioned many times, prefer us when he is playing up top except when on occasion there is acreage… Read more »
Would have liked to see 1) Less rotation at Cback. Mari is a good defender with composure but struggled to get into game first part of first half today. There should be no reason why we need to rotate as much in this area – disruptions not helpful IMO. 2) Pepe. Why is he not starting? He flattered to deceive on price tag last season and into this season but he has had a strong up tick in performance and looks confidence, in gar. Why is Arteta now disrupting this? Comes on and immediately a couple of sharp instinctive lay… Read more »
Good to see Martinelli back in.
Fabregaard
Unfortunately with each performance it is becoming less likely we can sign Odegaard. We obviously need him and want him to play at the best level he can (and it has shown us what we’ve been missing in the squad for a long time), but the better he plays the more expensive he becomes (if Real Madrid will even consider selling him). What has been so impressive is seeing how quickly he adapted to the Premier League (far more experienced players have taken much longer) and has become a leader on the pitch at such a young age.