Ahead of our Champions League Round of 16 first leg away to PSV Eindhoven on Tuesday, Mikel Arteta was at the Philips Stadion to meet the media in the pre-match press conference.
Among other topics, the boss was asked about changing the narrative, the strengths of PSV, rebuilding confidence and what his message to the players will be pre-match.
Here’s a full transcript:
on if tomorrow's game can help change the narrative:
It’s a game that obviously brings a different energy – it’s that competition that puts everyone on their toes. We’ve done a lot already this season here and now it’s the moment to start to make another strong step in the right direction that we want to. I’m very excited for the game.
on if we're among the contenders for the title:
I think in the group stages it was very different; I could see it very open, now I see it very closed because I just see one opponent which is PSV and tomorrow’s game, and that’s it. In the first stage, it’s been very different.
on mapping our path to the final:
The reality is that me personally as a coach, I just look at what’s ahead and what’s ahead is a team that has eliminated a team like Juventus, with a history. I know the difficulty; we played against them a lot in recent years and we know the difficulty of the match.
on how to instill belief into the players:
Well, try to explain how we’re going to do it and why we do things, and they try to deliver that in the best possible way. In the last two results it’s been very different, in terms of performance as well, not getting the right result that we want, but we’ve certainly been better, especially in the last game with the opposition. And the fact we still have gears, even with the players that we have, some of them have gears to take us to a different level. When it comes to that stage, it’s about lifting the level and the standards, every individual has to be at their best. When we do that, with the team that we have and the connection we have between us, we are a really strong team.
on if the boss has to lift his levels as well:
Yeah, but is expected and the reality, is really different many times. It’s part of our job; the moment that you have a result; it’s hurting but it has to last 24 hours because then you have to move on and you have the face the next game and the preparation. You cannot get away from that, that’s a big quality of a coach or any player at this level because in three days’ time, you’re going to have another match, and emotionally and physically, you’re going to have to be ready for it.
on if we are over the issues:
We cannot change it certainly – we have to learn from it, and we have to take that into the next game, that’s it. There’s a lot of things that we have learnt this season in the Champions League about ourselves – that’s part of the very near past, now it’s everything we’re doing now for the near future. That’s what’s going to count.
on his message to the players:
Certainly, focusing of what we have done in this competition and why we’ve done it. That’s the biggest reaction, because this doesn’t happen at that level of consistency for that many months for a random reason, it’s because we have it or not. There are certain things that we’re going to have to adapt, that’s certainly unquestionable, and still be very efficient and a top team.
on if he spoke to Josh Kroenke at training:
No, because he had to go, but yes very happy to have him around. He’s around a lot of times for big moments as well, he’s the one that really wants to be with the team. It’s great to have him, he’s been around today and hopefully in the next few days as well.
on if the visit gave him a boost:
Regardless of what situation you are in the league, when you start to come to this stage of the Champions League, it’s something else. You feel it in the atmosphere, in the energy of the place, it’s something else because it’s a competition you don’t play in weekly and you play in the moment where you’re in or out, and that gives you urgency and it gets the best out of you for sure.
on whether we have the firepower to win the competition:
Again it’s tunnel vision, it’s just PSV, being better than them to earn the right to win the game. That’s what we have to do.
on whether it will be a different style of game to what we have faced recently:
Normally they behave in a different way, but I don’t know, because they have done different things, special things depending on home or away so we’ll have to wait and see.
on what the team has learnt so far in the Champions League:
Especially about ourselves, we have played very differently home and away in the last year, especially in Europe. We have been much more consistent, we have scored a lot of goals, we have conceded hardly anything, I think we have conceded three goals and the lowest expected goals (against) in the group stage which is great. So that’s a big platform, so we have those resources at the disposal of the team, it’s something the team has already done and now we have to continue to do it.
on whether having the ball in the opposition half more leads to facing a low block:
Sometimes it’s not a choice. Sometimes we have had a lot of chances that we didn’t execute well enough, and that moment when teams are disorganised, and we are organised. We have faced a lot of them, we have played nearly every game for a back five for example. The other day they behaved like that in a different way because the winger was dropping. We are so used to that, it’s about execution after that.
on how he used the weekend off:
With the schedule we had, we could give most of the players some time off as well after the last game we had, and then do the preparation we normally do. It’s true we had more time so we focussed a lot of stuff on us as well, and not having to do just gameplans and very short training sessions relating to what’s going to happen in the game, so that was very useful.
on how important it will be to take a positive result from the first leg:
You are playing two games, you certainly know that, and everything starts tomorrow. Tomorrow you the more we play with the intention to dominate the game, be better than them and win it, the better the result will be I’m sure.
on PSV’s recent form:
The results vary in football, what I’m more interested in is how they behave, how they play, why they do certain things and what we expect them to do against us, and what their weaknesses are to try to beat them.
on how different it is to last year:
Every situation is different. One year in football is a long, long, long time! The context has changed, they have other players as well, we have other players as well, momentum is different. We played a competition at that moment where we were already qualified, they weren’t, and now it’s a tie to decide who is through, so it’s very different.
on whether it would be one of his best achievements as manager if we go through:
The achievement is to see the team that we all want to see tomorrow, being better than the opposition and winning the game. Don’t take it any further than that.
on the importance of the defensive record:
That’s for sure for any team, but if you look at the history of the teams who have been very successful, the defensive record is critical. And then we have shown we have the capacity to score a lot of goals in the competition, obviously the options are different but the team still has a lot of resources to do that.
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