Mikel Merino to Arsenal? The former Newcastle midfielder has the quality and character to excel under Mikel Arteta | Football News

“When I lose a duel, I am angry,” a furious Mikel Arteta shouted to his players after the FA Cup defeat to Nottingham Forest in 2022. The scene in the dressing room, captured in All or nothingIt has resurfaced following Arsenal’s interest in Mikel Merino.

Arteta has obviously succeeded in raising the team’s competitive standards in the years since. But the qualities mentioned in that explosive rebuke at the City Ground – commitment, concentration, fighting spirit – remain his must-haves.

And Mikel Merino is an example of this.

The 28-year-old, a European Championship winner with Spain this summer, specializes in winning duels. In fact, last season with Real Sociedad, he won more than any other player in Europe’s top five leagues. No one has even come close to his total of 326.

It is worth noting that the next highest player on the list, Newcastle’s Bruno Guimaraes, has also been a target for Arsenal in recent years. Evidently, the ability to win duels is something the club have been looking to add to their midfield.

But Merino doesn’t just have this to offer.

Standing 1.98m tall, and in line with Arsenal’s trend towards physically imposing players following the arrivals of Kai Havertz, Declan Rice and, more recently, Riccardo Calafiori, Merino boasts formidable aerial power and a knack for stealing the ball.

Julian Nagelsmann’s Germany revealed him at the Euros when, after a trademark run into the penalty area, he powered home a powerful header from a Dani Olmo cross to secure Spain’s place in the semi-finals in the penultimate minute of extra time.

Merino, despite not being a regular starter for Luis de la Fuente’s team, would finish the tournament as one of only four players (along with Alvaro Morata, Lamine Yamal and Mikel Oyarzabal) to have featured in all seven of Spain’s games as they won the trophy.

“I think that tournament reflected him well,” says Miguel Flaño, a former teammate at his childhood club, Osasuna. Vscek.

“He is used to starting matches and being very important for his club. But his role at the European Championship was different. Although he was not a starter, he showed a lot of humility, understanding that he could still be important in another way.

“And as we saw, he was decisive, especially with his goal against Germany, but also in the games where he didn’t score. He just puts the team first and thinks about how he can help.”

Merino’s rise, despite difficult spells with Borussia Dortmund and Newcastle, comes as no surprise to Flaño, or to anyone who knew him at Osasuna, where, having joined the team at 18, he was a key figure in their promotion to the Spanish top flight in 2016.

“He was the soul of the team, despite being very young,” says Alfredo Sanchez, former Osasuna player and assistant to Enrique Martin, the club’s coach at the time. Vscek.

“He had a tremendous personality and, in football terms, what you see of him now is what he was then. Very active on the left foot, adaptable to different situations, he can pass, he can beat a man, he is strong in the air and he knows when to get to the penalty area.”

“Mikel has always been a very complete player,” adds Flaño, another graduate of the club’s academy. “He’s very good technically and very intelligent tactically because he understands football very well.

“His aerial game is valuable in both defensive and offensive set pieces. He can really make the difference in those situations.

“And then, as far as mentality goes, he’s a guy who doesn’t feel pressure and has the personality to assert himself in important matches.”

Merino demonstrated his appetite for the big moments with his winner against Germany in Stuttgart, celebrated in the style of his father, Angel, who scored for Osasuna in a European game on the same pitch 33 years earlier. But it was evident from his youth.

Indeed, it was only thanks to a run of six goals in eight games from Merino that Osasuna achieved promotion in 2016, with his midfield helping them reach the play-offs despite having already agreed to join Dortmund at the end of the season.

“He was incredible in those games,” Sanchez recalls. “Decisive,” is the word Flaño uses. “That was the year he exploded at Osasuna,” Flaño adds. “He attracted a lot of attention.”

It didn’t work out for him at Dortmund, where he struggled to win against Thomas Tuchel. Then, after joining Newcastle, a poorly timed back injury thwarted a bright start and left him below Jonjo Shelvey and Mohamed Diame in Rafael Benitez’s midfield pecking order.

But now it’s definitely getting attention again.

Merino, who has excelled during his six years at Real Sociedad, during which he has been consistent in terms of both his availability and his performance level, has attracted the attention of Barcelona and Atletico Madrid this summer, as well as Arsenal.

“You have to be very good in all aspects of the game to reach the level where you attract the interest of so many big teams,” Sanchez says.

“We are talking about a first-class player.”

His role in Osasuna’s promotion campaign was as the more attacking midfielder between the two linchpins, encouraged to make forays into the penalty area.

“He was playing more like a No. 10 before we came to the club, but we felt he wasn’t comfortable there,” Sanchez explains. “We moved him back and found that role was ideal for him.”

However, it is the role he subsequently played at Real Sociedad – as the left number 8 in a three-man midfield – that is perhaps most indicative of how he could be deployed at Arsenal.

Arteta’s 4-3-3 formation is similar to Real Sociedad’s and the presence of captain Martin Odegaard, a player Merino worked well with during the Norwegian’s loan from Real Madrid in 2019/20, adds a further touch of familiarity.

Arsenal’s hope is that he can be a late replacement for Granit Xhaka, helping restore danger and fluidity on the left flank, alongside Calafiori, while allowing Rice to return to his natural role as a No.6.

Merino is not an equal replacement for Xhaka. He is more physical and less technical. But his relatively low passing accuracy rate of 77 percent at Real Sociedad can be explained, at least in part, by a propensity to take risks with his distribution.

Merino, while comfortable recycling possession and slowly building play, prefers to move the ball forward, which could help Gabriel Martinelli, whose form dipped without Xhaka last season and who is most effective when running into passes behind him.

His character is probably also one of the reasons why Arteta appreciates him.

Merino’s football education took place in a region of Spain, Navarra, which borders Arteta’s native Basque Country and shares many of the same sporting principles.

“An Osasuna player is usually a competitive and hard-working player,” explains Flaño, who spent time as a coach in the club’s academy after retiring from competitive football.

“We may not necessarily be brilliant players who stand out, but we are humble, reliable and consistent, and that usually ends up paying off in the long run. Mikel has those qualities but, of course, the other important thing is that he AND even brilliant.

“I think Arteta conveys the same things in the way he addresses the press and in some of the comments he makes.

“You can tell he really likes those players, tireless workers who move around the field, who have passion, who are not flashy or showy, but know how to compete and take care of the details.”

Merino’s competitive nature also impressed Sanchez. “He gets a lot of yellow cards, because he has a lot of heart and gives everything,” he says. “But that, combined with his ability to defend and attack equally well, is why he got to where he is.”

It is partly for this reason that those who know him have no doubts about his potential for success in England, despite his first spell in the Premier League with Newcastle proving short-lived.

“I think he was too young when the Newcastle opportunity came,” Sanchez says. “Different culture, different structure, different start times. He experienced all that at a very young age.

“Now I see him much more prepared. He has much more experience, many more games under his belt both at club and international level, and his body is also stronger.

“I could see him anywhere, but I think he would be perfect for Arsenal, for their system and their style, with a lot of possession and a lot of running into the box. I think he would like it.

“And remember, we’re talking about a top-level player who never hides.”

Arteta will have noticed that Merino is not the type to back down from a duel.