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Arteta on differences from last Sporting meeting | News

Arteta on differences from last Sporting meeting | News
Posted on | Posted on Taylor Reeves

On Tuesday we return to the Estadio Jose Alvalade for the first time since the start of 2023, but Mikel Arteta says his team looks completely different to when they met Sporting in the Europa League.

In March 2023, we drew 2-2 in the first leg of the Europa League knockout round in the Portuguese capital before losing on penalties in the second leg. Five of our players who played in that first leg have now left the club and the coach said he recently watched the game again and barely recognized his team. He said it shows how much progress the team has made in the last 18 months or so.

“Usually it’s a good exercise to see the team from a few years ago and I watched both games again to get an understanding of that,” he said in his pre-match press conference.

“How we prepared them, what worked well and what didn’t, it’s difficult to recognize the team two years later. You tend to see and look at the game and other things differently, but it was good.

“In a way it seemed fair for a while, but here we are again. The good news is that we are now in a different competition, a competition that we really want to win, be dominant and important, and this is where we are.

“Every team continues to develop and it was incredible to talk about Sporting and their achievements. And we’ve also made a lot of progress compared to two years ago, so it will be a good test.”

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Sporting go into this game having won all 11 league games so far this season and are unbeaten in their last four Champions League games. However, this was achieved under Rube Almorim, who moved to Manchester United, but Mikel feels that beating Sporting will be a difficult task due to the quality he has brought to the team and their style of play, but one that we can achieve.

We haven’t had any success in our last five away games in Europe, but after almost getting a good result against Inter Milan last time out, Mikel believes we’re on the right track to end that run.

“It’s definitely something we need to improve,” he added. “We took the right steps and when we look back at how we played against Inter, against a team that was so dominant in the league, we were in the Champions League final and we would have the game that we Should have won, played and dominated.

“But the reality is you have to do it and we didn’t do that. These are the steps we need to take next: be ruthless and much more efficient in the opposition box, and when we get there, do what we have to do to take the three points away from here.

“The run (Sporting) is incredible, it shows that it’s not just about their qualities, but also their ambition, the team energy they have, that’s a big challenge we have. “Coming here tomorrow, making a statement and showing that we are capable of being ourselves against this type of opponent and winning the game.”

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