Mikel Arteta on Arsenal transfer targets, potential summer exits… and why a Champions League identity is key

Mikel Arteta is adamant Arsenal remains an attractive team for players to join and believes the club cannot stop viewing themselves as a Champions League side.

Arsenal currently sit ninth in the Premier League and are on course to finish outside of the European places for the first time since 1995.

The Gunners have also not played in the Champions League since the 2016/17 campaign and are set to miss out on that again this term.

When asked, however, if there would come a point when he’d stop viewing Arsenal as a Champions League club Arteta replied: "While I am sitting in this chair I’m not, because that’s the only thing that I think of this football club."

The Spaniard believes too the club remains an attractive destination for top players and that has not changed even with their dip in form.

Arsenal FC via Getty Images

"We've an incredible history, an incredible structure, in a beautiful city and a style of play that attracts players," he said.

"And I'm telling you now because when I am closer to the market now when I speak to people, a lot of players want to play for Arsenal.

"What I need to do first of all is myself do my work as good as possible, improve this team and the players individually as much as possible and get the maximum out of that.

"And then what we need to do at the end of the season is, OK, see the direction we want to take, agree on the ambition of the football club, realise where we are.

"The demands are going to be huge – it doesn't matter what we do, that's never going to be change because it's linked to our history and our success – and [we need to] move from there."

Arsenal’s transfer budget for this summer is yet to be determined, with qualification for the Europa League likely to impact their spending.

Arteta is not expecting player sales to be forced upon him, but he refused to rule out the possibility of players going.

"I’m not expecting that. I’m not saying it’s not a possibility, I don't know, in football everything is possible," he said.

The fear for Arsenal is that they could be cut adrift in the race for the Champions League if they don’t spend, with returning to the competition getting tougher each year they miss out on qualification.

In Pictures | Tottenham vs Arsenal, north London derby | 12/07/2020

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"If you are not in the Champions League and you say: ‘OK, I don’t invest because I don’t have the financial ability to do it’, but the other clubs invest, then the gap becomes bigger," Arteta added.

"If I do want to invest and risk, and then I don’t reach it, what happens?

"So at some stage you have to make a decision, whether I want to aim to make that gap closer and go for it, or I stay where I am."

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