Arteta delights in “statement” win as Merino keeps title hopes alive

Mikel Arteta said Arsenal needed to make a “statement” against Leicester after a week dominated by discussion of their paucity of attacking options.

After losing Kai Havertz to a season-ending hamstring tear and with Gabriel Martinelli and Bukayo Saka also recovering from similar muscular injuries, all eyes were on how the Gunners would cope at the King Power – and whether they’d pay an immediate price for failing to strengthen in January.

Thanks to a late brace by substitute Mikel Merino, sent on as an auxiliary striker in place of the abject Raheem Sterling, that chat can take a back seat for a few hours, and maybe even days.

The Spaniard entered the fray on 69 minutes and didn’t waste any time making his presence felt. He’d already come desperately close to converting a Jurrien Timber cross when he rose in the box to head home Ethan Nwaneri’s pinpoint ball to break the deadlock with 10 minutes left.

The summer signing then wrapped up the points, caressing the ball home at the back post after good work by Leandro Trossard.

“A big win,” reflected Arteta in his post-game interview with TNT Sports.

“Obviously, we haven’t played a game for 10 days now after the break. And today is a day, you know, with all the questions that have been raised, obviously with injuries, to make a statement that we are here, that we really won it.

“I think they were two very different halves. The first one, we lacked some urgency and were very inconsistent, especially on simple things with the ball and without the ball. But the second half, we picked it up and we managed to win the game.”

After news of Havertz’s injury broke earlier in the week, there were rumours that Merino could be tasked with playing as a target man. The player intimated in his own post-game comments that he hadn’t discussed the position change until this morning and that he wasn’t expecting the experiment to last. That said, as auditions go, it couldn’t have gone much better.

Asked what pep talk he gave to Merino before sending him on, Arteta said: “That he was going to score. He’s a real goal threat.

“The moment that they were defending a little bit deeper and we were more established and more set in the final third, we thought that he could deliver those moments. But then he’s here to say that, to get it done. And he was brilliant.”

Despite Merino doing a decent impression of Havertz, Arteta doesn’t see many other similarities. “Because of the height? No, I think they are very, very different.

“Mikel has never played as a nine. But he’s got that timing, that smell that he can smell danger, he can anticipate the situation and then he can execute, obviously.

“I didn’t want to drive them crazy. So I said to him this morning that he might play there. If the game was [needing him]. We believed that you could see him in that moment, depending on the game context. And he did, and he won the game for us.”

While Merino was the game-winner, the victory was built on the efforts of Arsenal’s teenage duo Myles Lewis-Skelly and Ethan Nwaneri. The former made a vital goal-denying interception while the game hung in the balance while the latter, a constant bright spark, twice hit the woodwork before delivering the cross for his side’s opener.

“Unbelievable,” was Arteta’s assessment of the pair. “They were involved in two of the biggest moments of the game. One, when he just touches that ball that if he doesn’t it’s a goal, on the counter after the giveaway in the middle.

“Then Ethan, that every time, first half even, every time he was on the ball, he looked a threat and he put one on the crossbar, one on the post and he put a beautiful cross for the goal as well.”

“I think when you see their behaviour and naturally how they’re behaving on the pitch, let them go,” he said.

“It’s something to protect them. As well, take the handbrake off – if they are ready to go at that pace, why should we stop them? Because they are 17? I think they both have an unbelievable environment at home and with the people at the club, and slowly but firmly [we use them].”

For 24 hours, the gap on league leaders Liverpool has been reduced to four points. Given it could have been as wide as nine points had the Reds not conceded in the 98th minute against Everton on Wednesday, there’s plenty of reason for cheer in the Arsenal camp.

“Regardless of what happens or the difficulties that we’re going to face, we’re going to give it a real go, the team really wants it,” said Arteta.

“We’ve been seven, eight months already working on that and we’re not going to stop. And let’s see how far we can go.”