Earlier this week, Arsenal ran an interview with Fabio Vieira in which the summer signing from Porto declared, “after six months, I am completely adapted.”
It seems manager Mikel Arteta agrees with that confident assertion and is keen to give the Portuguese midfielder more minutes.
To date, Vieira has started just one Premier League match – against Brentford in September – and aside from an early appearance off the bench at Wolves has had to feed off scraps in the closing stages of matches.
Last weekend at Aston Villa, he registered another assist – his fifth in all competitions this season – once again demonstrating that he can make a difference when called upon by the boss.
“He is starting to give me big headaches because I see every single day what he is capable of doing,” said Arteta ahead of the trip to Leicester.
“A tremendous player; he now understands exactly what we want and physically he is in a condition to compete at the right level in this league.
“He brings qualities that we don’t have in the squad. Very eager to give him more [minutes].”
Arriving from Portugal with an injury that forced him to sit out most of pre-season was definitely a blow for the new boy but having reached full fitness and spent plenty of time in the gym trying to bulk up, he seems well-equipped for the closing month of the season.
To ensure they get the best out of Vieira, Arteta knows Arsenal need to play to the player’s strengths.
“If he needs to compete for 30 balls in the air against certain players in this league, I think he is going to lose 28,” he said.
“But if we give him the ball in the right spaces, and if we ask him to do some defensive work he can do… if we put him in front of goal the amount of times that we want to do, I think he will do really well in this league.
“But if we do the opposite I don’t think he is going to do well.”
As the dust settled on today’s press conference, Arsenal were handed a Europa League draw that will see Vieira return to Lisbon. Having spent his entire youth career at Porto he’ll no doubt be excited at the opportunity to go head-to-head with their great rivals Sporting.
Quality. He’s going to do well for us.
Exciting times, feels like we have so much talent coming through. That combined with our already full blood stallions in Saliba, Martinelli and Saka, and also everyone else is like 25 years old?!
What a great time to be a live, let’s destroy Leicester today and on we go!
COYG!
This is a player I don’t get how he’s going to be used. easy to see that he’s a good player, not so easy for me to see how he’s going to be utilized. arteta and edu seem very keen on him, is he challenging odegaard? are they going to use him to rest saka. I don’t get where he starts for us.
Vieira, if he gets going, has the quality to bench anyone. It’s only a matter of time before he blows up on the big stage, he has that midas touch.
Ideally, you’d play him where Odegaard plays but the opportunity to link up with his buddy Martinelli is also a tantalising one. We need to bring him on more for Xhaka against those deep laying defenses. Imagine him and Jorginho coming on for saka and Nketiah, to take control and close out games..
don’t think he’s the replacement for xhaka, hopefully that’s Declan rice. I would rather esr be the more attacking option at left 8. probably the best ball carrier we have apart from jesus ,believe esr was our top scorer last year. I don’t see him playing there. will get the usual downvotes, but someone explain to me where he’s going to play? I can’t see where.
We have two advanced creative midfield positions to fill. Currently Xhaka and Ødegaard – he can rotate with either of them as required and ESR does the same.
We are back in the big time and need two excellent players in every position.
Rice and Partey could share the DM role.
Think a squad built more like City ready to fight for Prem & CL at the same time. A beautiful prospect!
You can try guessing or you could just wait and see, like most of us.
Who knows, he might have some goalkeeping qualities we’re about to find out 😌
I am guessing, definitely don’t want to see him in goals though.
He is at Arsenal bcoz of his versatility, check his CV. He can play as replacement for odegaard, saka, martinelli or Xaka, making him important for arsenal. I wil trust the process
No need to overcomplicate. He was bought as a sub to Odegaard, with the potential to challenge him, or to play alongside him, i.e. in Xhaka’s place.
I would play him in the xhaka role
Versatility is one of the Arteta’ Transfer philosophy. He can used be any attacking position behind the striker
He reminds me of Bernardo at City. When he joined city, I thought he was a bit too lightweight to adjust to the prem. I don’t think he had a fantastic first season either. But they found a system in which he could play, and he’s now one of the best versatile midfielders in the league. I hope the same for Vieira, see him playing the same ‘Bernardo Silva role’ for Arsenal in the seasons to come. Wish him the best and hope he lives up to his potential.
That’s a very good comparison. Let’s hope he follows the same path.
The contribution by Vieira, ESR, Nelson, (alongside with Trossars and Jorginho who have already been employed successfully )will define the rest of our season. they can step up and win us the nil-nil games. Hopefully they get plenty of chances as soon as possible, and most likely in the Europa League.
I’d say more than that Eddie’s contribution in the next few weeks until Jesus is back might define our season. Really need him to go on another scoring run and it’s something he can do, but also need Ode and Martinelli (and possibly yes contribution by the guys you said) back to their best to give him the kind of through balls balls and crosses he needs to get going.
Once Jesus is fully healthy I reckon we’ll go on another good run. Just need to hang on and keep pace with City until then…
Oops two balls are probably unnecessary but at least now I have your attention
The timing of his pass to Martinelli at Villa Park was nano-second perfect.
The Europa League, hopefully, affords him more game time and the opportunity to make Arteta’s life more miserable.