In a display of sheer managerial overcomplication, Mikel Arteta made his Arsenal players train to You’ll Never Walk Alone before their 4-0 loss to Liverpool.
After working as his assistant at Man City, Arteta has fostered a reputation as Pep Guardiola-lite, and his methods on and off the pitch live up to that.
The Spaniard and his players are subject of the latest instalment of the Amazon Prime documentary All or Nothing, and a new clip has unveiled a bizarre approach in training.
In the buildup to the Premier League clash between Liverpool and Arsenal at Anfield in November, Arteta had his players training with You’ll Never Walk Alone played over speakers in the background.
Designed to replicate the atmosphere at Anfield, Arteta described it as “one of my crazy ideas,” though there was certainly an element of method in his madness.
EXCLUSIVE CLIP
The atmosphere at Anfield can be intense ?So Mikel Arteta prepares his players by blasting out You’ll Never Walk Alone during training ? #AONArsenal pic.twitter.com/CjBQ3Lsn3T
— Amazon Prime Video Sport (@primevideosport) August 2, 2022
“There is a word that we use in Spain in cycling, when a cyclist is going up and looks amazing, then in one kilometre he goes ‘boom’ and looks like he’s struggling again,” he explained.
“The word is bajar and I had it once, at Anfield.
“The game was going well and then suddenly I could only see red shirts flying around. The game is passing all over me and I cannot react.
“People said ‘what is he doing?’ and I cannot do it, I cannot do it emotionally, physically I cannot cope, everything goes too fast.
“I only had that feeling in my career once and it was at Anfield.”
Arsenal then arrived at Anfield and found themselves subject to a barrage of red, with Liverpool seeing 63 percent of possession and firing 19 shots on goal to the Gunners’ five.
Funnily enough, the tide turned for Liverpool in a single moment as Arteta lost his cool and confronted Jurgen Klopp on the touchline; from then on, it was relentless as the Kop piled on the pressure.
Sadio Mane, Diogo Jota, Mohamed Salah and Takumi Minamino all scored in a 4-0 win for the Reds.
Bajar.
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