Mikel Arteta and Christian Norgaard met the media as we continued the build-up to our friendly with Newcastle United in Singapore.
We face The Magpies this Sunday (12.30pm kick off UK) in the second game of our Asia Tour, and so our summer signing and manager held a pre-match press conference after our open training session in the Singapore National Stadium.
They were asked about new signings, settling into the club, expectations for the season and more. Here’s a full transcript:
on Cristhian Mosquera joining in training to integrate him early:
MA: Exactly that. I’m very happy to have him. It’s a player that we have been monitoring for a long, long time and he has decided to join us. We are very, very happy to have him already with us.
on whether any further signings would also come to Asia:
MA: Yes, for sure. Obviously, once we have analysed everything with a player, we would want to integrate him with the team as soon as possible. With Noni it wasn’t possible because he needed some time and he’s going to take a short vacation. He said he wants to join straight away, as soon as we are back. But the others, if we can do it immediately, I think it’s better, so he can start to join the team, get to know each other and get the ideas that we want to put in the mix.
on the interest in Victor Gyokeres:
MA: Unfortunately, you know that I can’t talk about that.
on Christian’s first pre-season with Arsenal:
CN: It’s been great. The boys have really welcomed me in a good way. A lot of information, of course. A lot of new drills. Especially the pitch stuff is, of course, new to me. But I feel really welcome and it’s been a good pre-season so far.
on the fitness of Gabriel and Jurrien Timber:
MA: Gabi got a little niggle in training and we didn’t want to take any risk. Hopefully in the next week or so he’s going to be able to train and play again. And with Jurrien, he’s getting very close. He’s almost hit every point that we needed after the surgery and the period of rehab that he needed. And I think in the next few days he’s going to start doing it again.
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on coming up against former manager Thomas Frank next week:
CN: It’s fine. We’ll get the pre-season game out of the way and then we get straight to business when the season starts. It’ll be good to see him, of course. I had a pretty good time with him at Brentford. But life goes on as well. I’m in a different place, he’s in a different place. But yes, it’ll be interesting, of course, to play against him now after I’ve played with him for a long time.
on other clubs’ business in the transfer market:
MA: It’s the competition, you saw straight away before the Club World Cup, what Man City did straight away. We’ve seen what Chelsea have done, Man United, Spurs and, of course, Liverpool. So you see every club is very, very active. Everybody wants to get better. It’s the quality of the squad, the depth of the squad and it’s no different with us.
on Christian settling at the club:
CN: I think it’s a good point that Mikel made in terms of getting players in as quickly as possible. I’ve been able to be with the team from day one of pre-season. I think it’s benefited me a lot. I’m much further down the line now in terms of the integration of play than I would have been if I had joined now. So it’s been fantastic so far. It’s such a good group, such a good group of staff and the whole team around has made everything very easy.
on whether Christian’s role will be different at Arsenal to at Brentford:
CN: I’m realistic, of course. I know this is a step up in terms of quality, size of club. But I’m also here to contribute, of course, otherwise I wouldn’t have made the move. But I also know that there are some of the best players in the world in my position here, so it will be competitive. There are the things you see at the weekend on the pitch, but there’s a lot of other things going on around the football team. And I hope I can really help this team both on and off the pitch.
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on whether Christian expects to play a lot of games:
CN: It’s about being available. It’s about being fit. I’m used to playing 38 games plus a couple of cup games. Here it will be close to 60 games maybe, so you need a full squad. For me, it’s about being available. I know my chances will come, and then it’s just about taking it like that.
on Gabriel Martinelli’s role:
MA: We’ve got a lot of front players and they are really dependent on the environment that we create around them, and to create and to open the spaces so they can explore them. We always want better and more from every single player. I think Gabi has performed very consistently in the last three or four seasons. He had the bad injury that he picked up and he missed quite a lot of games, but I’m very happy with what he’s done for us.
on how Mikel decides who plays up front:
MA: The same as the other players, at the end, it’s about impact and performance. And there is a moment, a state of moment in every player, how they are feeling, how the emotional state is, what their confidence is. And then as well, what the connection that you’re going to generate within the team. Who links better with what we’re doing in relation to what we want to achieve that game against a particular opponent that behaves in a specific way. So we make a decision in relation to that. Once someone is in the right moment and pushing with full confidence, I’m not going to stop him playing.
on Cristhian Mosquera’s arrival:
MA: Eaise the level, raise the competition. Last season we learned that with the depth that we had in the squad and in the backline, it wasn’t enough, and Cristhian is going to help us a lot in that. He has different qualities to what we had in the backline. He’s going to add a huge amount of hunger because he’s so willing to come here and contribute to the team. And we have to give him a little bit of time to pick ideas and adapt here. But he’s got great qualities to add as well.
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on the competition for places:
CN: There’s a lot of competition, but for me, it was a chance to represent Arsenal at the age of 31. I was coming to a later stage in my career and I signed a new deal with Brentford. But when the interest came from Arsenal and after my first talks with Mikel, it was very clear to me that I would do everything to be able to play here. To get this adventure, to be part of a team that has such big ambitions, is for me an amazing step to take this stage in my career.
on whether Mikel feels pressure to deliver a trophy this season:
MA: Pressure is a great word. I think that means that there is belief in our ability to achieve what we want to achieve. And we’ve been very, very close the last few seasons and the whole team is going to determine whether we achieve that or not. But we have to make sure that we don’t lose sight of what we have to do daily to get to the levels that we want, to set the demands that we want within this goal. Because that’s the most important one. The internal demands have to always exceed any external demand. That’s what we are trying to achieve every single day.
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