{"id":177375,"date":"2025-09-23T23:15:16","date_gmt":"2025-09-23T23:15:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/177375\/"},"modified":"2025-09-23T23:15:16","modified_gmt":"2025-09-23T23:15:16","slug":"mikel-arteta-bites-back-at-critics-who-blasted-his-handbrake-tactics-against-man-city-as-extremely-surprised-arsenal-boss-gives-a-different-one-word-verdict-on-the-1-1-draw","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/177375\/","title":{"rendered":"Mikel Arteta bites back at critics who blasted his ‘handbrake’ tactics against Man City – as ‘extremely surprised’ Arsenal boss gives a different one-word verdict on the 1-1 draw’"},"content":{"rendered":"

By ISAAN KHAN, REPORTER<\/a> <\/p>\n

Published: 13:18 EDT, 23 September 2025 | Updated: 13:41 EDT, 23 September 2025 <\/p>\n

Mikel Arteta<\/a>\u00a0has hit back at critics who roundly criticised his ‘handbrake approach’ in Arsenal<\/a>‘s 1-1 draw against Manchester City on Sunday.<\/p>\n

Arteta\u00a0received a barrage of blame for his cautious tactics, which saw him start a midfield three of Mikel Merino, Martin Zubimendi\u00a0and Declan Rice<\/a>, with Leandro Trossard<\/a>\u00a0at left wing.<\/p>\n

That left Ebere\u00a0Eze and Gabriel Martinelli<\/a>, who scored in injury time, on the bench before being brought on later in the game.<\/p>\n

Gary Neville<\/a> questioned whether the Gunners believe they can win the league after claiming that Arteta had to ‘take the handbrake off’ against a\u00a0Man City<\/a> side who just had 32.8 per cent possession \u2014 the lowest total in Pep Guardiola<\/a>‘s managerial career for a league match.<\/p>\n

Ahead of Arsenal’s third round Carabao Cup<\/a> tie against League One side Port Vale, when asked if he was surprised by the ‘handbrake’ comments and criticism, Arteta\u00a0said: ‘I don’t read it, but he [media officer] does tell me what the narrative is around it.<\/p>\n

‘I would be extremely surprised with my knowledge and my know-how and how I analyse a football game.<\/p>\n

\"Arsenal <\/p>\n

Arsenal boss Mikel Arteta has hit back at critics of his approach to the draw with Manchester City on Sunday<\/p>\n

\"Arteta <\/p>\n

Arteta started the likes of Mikel Merino (pictured) before withdrawing him at half time<\/p>\n

\"Gary <\/p>\n

Gary Neville raised eyebrows at\u00a0Arteta having to ‘take the handbrake off’ against a Man City side who just had 32.8 per cent possession<\/p>\n

‘Because it was impossible for somebody to predict such a dominance from Arsenal throughout 96 minutes, because it has never happened in 17 years of Pep as a manager.<\/p>\n

‘So if the narrative goes somewhere else, how can you be dominant against such a team if you have, what was the word, ‘handbrake’? Dominance and handbrake – they are two different words. But I accept everything. I will learn more to have a different vision.<\/p>\n

‘When I saw everything and watching it back and all the stats, I was surprised. But I respect everybody’s opinion. And if I can see and learn something that I haven’t seen, I’m more than happy to do so.’<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Arteta\u00a0confirmed Noni Madueke is out for a few weeks with a knee injury.<\/p>\n

Madueke underwent scans on Monday after injuring his right knee during Sunday’s match.<\/p>\n

The winger was seen clutching his right knee towards the end of the first half of the game and was replaced at half-time by Bukayo\u00a0Saka.<\/p>\n

Arteta said: ‘Yeah, he’s going to be out for a few weeks. We don’t really know yet, probably we’re going to have to do a scan next week again. He felt something at the beginning of the match, he tried to carry on and at half-time he was too sore, so that’s it.<\/p>\n

‘It doesn’t look too bad.’<\/p>\n


\n
\n<\/a><\/p>\n

Share or comment on this article:
\n Mikel Arteta bites back at critics who blasted his ‘handbrake’ tactics against Man City – as ‘extremely surprised’ Arsenal boss gives a different one-word verdict on the 1-1 draw’<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By ISAAN KHAN, REPORTER Published: 13:18 EDT, 23 September 2025 | Updated: 13:41 EDT, 23 September 2025 Mikel…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":177376,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[69],"tags":[463,98,27190,105507,399,87911,63566,87912,4896,4501,403,1079,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-177375","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-soccer","8":"tag-arsenal","9":"tag-dailymail","10":"tag-declan-rice","11":"tag-efl-cup","12":"tag-football","13":"tag-gabriel-martinelli","14":"tag-gary-neville","15":"tag-leandro-trossard","16":"tag-manchester-city","17":"tag-mikel-arteta","18":"tag-soccer","19":"tag-sport","20":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/177375","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=177375"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/177375\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/177376"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=177375"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=177375"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=177375"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}