The 7-1 victory of Tuesday evening at PSV Eindhoven saw six of Arsenal stars find the net and Mikel Arteta wants to take that form in the journey of this weekend to Manchester United.
Jurrien Timber, Ethan Nwaneri, Mikel Merino, Martin Odegaard, Leandro Trossard and Riccardo Calafiori all came to the Score Sheet in Philips Stadium on a historic night in the Champions League.
The victory over PSV came from the back of two games without a victory, a 1-0 loss at home at West Ham United and a 0-0 draw in Nottingham Forest. But Arteta believes that the heroic deeds on Tuesday evening lifted the mood in the camp while Gunners prepared to go back to Old Trafford on Sunday.
He said: “It was a great evening for us in an important competition where we have a lot of hope. The way we did it has lifted everyone, but that is unfortunately in the past.
“It's about what we are doing today, the preparation for tomorrow and trying to replicate a great achievement.”
As the business end of the 2024/25 campaign approach, Arteta is eager to see offensive intention of the entire field, not just our attackers.
“We have to look at threats from all areas,” Mikel added in his press conference for the competition. “We have lost very important wing players who gave a lot for us in the last third part and we also want to explore other options. The team has this capacity to adjust, we have many players with great football information to understand when we have to move and why, especially to do certain things.
“Recently we certainly went and we saw actions and combinations that are very difficult to defend.”
Two defenders achieved the victory against PSV, where Juriren's Backpostkop opened the score and Riccardo completion procedure with a fine right-wing finish. It is not the first time that Arsenal's Italian international has shown his attacking bravery this campaign, with a miracle strike in Manchester City and a crucial winner at Wolves.
The boss admits that the impressive talents of Calafiori have drawn his attention and hopes that he can remain a threat to the rest of the season.
He said: “He certainly has the ability to flow in areas that, for a defender, is very unusual, that was something that really attracted my attention.
“The other is that he is very unpredictable, sometimes chaotic, and that can also be very difficult from the position. That eye for goal, especially from open play, I did not have the understanding of the things he could do, but you see it daily in training that he is able to create things.”
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