Mikel Arteta: Arsenal target outlined ‘entertaining’ managerial philosophy as a player in 2014

The Manchester City assistant coach is seen as a strong candidate to replace Unai Emery at the Emirates

Mikel Arteta has ambitions to instil an “expressive” and “entertaining” philosophy when he eventually becomes a manager.

The Manchester City assistant coach is considered the front-runner to replace Unai Emery permanently at Arsenal.

And Arteta, during his time with the Gunners as a player, detailed his plans to become a manager one day with a clear set of ideas.

“My philosophy will be clear. I will have everyone 120 per cent committed, that’s the first thing,” Arteta told the Arsenal magazine in May 2014. “If not, you don’t play for me. When it’s time to work it’s time to work, and when it’s time to have fun then I’m the first one to do it, but that commitment is vital.

“Then I want the football to be expressive, entertaining. I cannot have a concept of football where everything is based on the opposition. We have to dictate the game, we have to be the ones taking the initiative, and we have to entertain the people coming to watch us. I’m 100 per cent convinced of those things, and I think I could do it.”

Arsene Wenger, Pep Guardiola and Mauricio Pochettino are the principal inspirations for Arteta as a manager.

While he also elaborated on his desired set-up and the way he would prepare for games.

“I think you need to adapt,” Arteta continued. “You can have an idea of a system, but you need to be able to transform it depending on the players you have – how much pace you have up front, how technical your team is, what types of risk you can take and whether your players are ready to take those risks.

Arteta has a clear idea of how he would manage a team (Getty)

“It’s important to analyse your players because you can’t always play the same way. There have to be different details and changes in how you approach things, and you have to look at how you can hurt whoever you are playing against. Is there something they don’t like to do? If so, we’re going to make them do plenty of it.

“Then the most important thing for the manager is that, the Friday before the game, you imagine what’s going to happen on the Saturday. And if what happens on Saturday is not what I had planned, then it’s not been good enough from me.”