Arsenal appoint Arteta as head coach

Arsenal have appointed Mikel Arteta, their former captain as their head coach on a three and half year contract after the club sacked Unai Emery earlier in November. 

Youth team coach Freddie Ljungberg was appointed as the interim boss after the sacking. 

Mikel Arteta had been serving the role of assistant manager to Pep Guardiola at Arsenal's Premier League rivals Manchester City. 

Arteta was also rumoured to be the head coach of Arsenal in 2018, but it was eventually Unai Emery who had made the cut back then. 

Arteta joins the club at a crisis moment as Arsenal are 10th in the Premier League. Unai Emery was sacked after staying winless in seven matches. 

Emery had taken the club to the Europa League final in the last season but failed to win as the Gunners lost to Chelsea. 

In an interview with Arsenal after his appointment, Arteta said that it was a great honour for him to be appointed as head coach. He said, "This is a huge honour. Arsenal is one of the biggest clubs in the world. We need to be competing for the top trophies in the game and that's been made very clear to me in my discussions with Stan and Josh Kroenke, and the senior people from the club."

He further added, "We all know there is a lot of work to be done to achieve that but I am confident we'll do it. I'm realistic enough to know it won't happen overnight but the current squad has plenty of talent and there is a great pipeline of young players coming through from the academy."

Arteta also stated that he will try to bring the Arsenal from the past. He said, "My first task will be to get to know the players better and get them playing the kind of fast flowing, attacking football that Arsenal supporters around the world want to see."

Arteta featured for Arsenal 150 times, scoring 16 goals and providing 8 assists. He also won a couple of FA cups with Arsenal.