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Mikel Arteta has described William Saliba as ‘rare’, after the defender grabbed his first Arsenal goal in style against Bournemouth in a 3-0 victory at the weekend.
THE LOWDOWN: ALREADY A POPULAR FIGURE
In a short time at Arsenal, Saliba has already grown to be a fan favourite as well as a respected figure in the club’s dressing room.
The young Frenchman showed glimpses of what was to come after impressing in pre-season and carried that form to the Premier League campaign.
His debut against Crystal Palace was one to remember, where he was handed the man-of-the-match award for a stellar display as Arsenal claimed a 2-0 win at Selhurst Park.
Against Leicester City, he scored an unfortunate own goal but barely put a foot wrong besides that. This was evidently summed up as fans cheered him on even after the own goal.
At the weekend against Bournemouth, Saliba impressed again against Bournemouth with another fine display and capped it off with a stunning strike on his weaker foot that left many stunned, including teammate Oleksandr Zinchenko.
Asides his brilliant goal, he had an overall perfect performance, where he managed 100% pass accuracy
100% shot accuracy, 100% long ball accuracy, 83 touches, 75 passes completed, 5x possession won, two clearances, two tackles, two interceptions and two duels won.
THE LATEST: ARTETA LEFT IN AWE
Not for the first time this season, Mikel Arteta has heaped praise on Saliba after a Premier League game but this time, the Spaniard admitted some surprise about the player’s quality and technique.
When asked post-match if he thought his centre-back was capable of a strike of that quality, Arteta said: “To be fair, no. That is individual talent and a moment of quality that he showed today but I am really pleased with his performance.
“What he is doing at 21 years old is rare. He remains really humble. He wants to learn, he wants to train every day and he is really demanding of himself and he is giving a lot to the team.
“It is very important to get the clean sheet as well. Everybody is scoring goals and that’s good.”
Captain Martin Odegaard bagged an early brace within 11 minutes to put the Gunners in ascendency before Saliba put an icing on the cake in the second half. Arteta was also impressed with the mentality shown by his players.
“We are really happy to come here and win 3-0,” he added. “We really were dominant and convincing, right from the off. We wanted to grab the game and be a threat and obviously, the two goals that we scored gave us confidence.
“When you are ahead obviously it changes the game and put it in a position where we are much more confident after that, and then the third goal just killed it. We expected a very different reaction in the second half from Bournemouth which they did, they started to put the ball with long throws in our box much more often and we struggled a little bit to control the game.”
THE VERDICT: MORE OF THE SAME
Arsenal have started the season well and look like the team to beat at the moment. A lot of players seem to have improved while the extra competition for spots will put everyone on their toes.
The Gunners will now aim to continue their perfect start to the season when they take on Fulham at the Emirates this Saturday.
