Mertesacker on Mikel Arteta
Per Mertesacker has revealed that when Mikel Arteta left Arsenal in 2016 he wrote a note telling the club to hire him.
The message was sent to Gunner’s chief executive at the time Ivan Gazidis and urged him to find a spot for Mertesacker in the club.
The German told the Evening Standard: “When [Arteta] left us, he left Ivan Gazidis a note saying: ‘You can’t lose this guy’,
“[It was] in terms of: you are losing me now, you are asking me too late. Because he had promised to go to City.
“He told Ivan: ‘You can’t lose this guy. Just put him somewhere’. That was kind of the start, and we kept tabs.
“And then between him and Unai [Emery], that was the situation.
“I put a good word in for him, without knowing how good he was as a coach. I knew how good he was as a human being and how much I trusted him.
“He called me when he didn’t get the job to say: ‘Thank you, I know you put my name forward’. A year and a half after when he then came, and Edu came, it felt like the right time.
“From there it has been a feeling of trust, that we both do the best for the club and it is pretty much aligned.”
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