Arsenal’s problems might be unsolvable, admits Pep Guardiola

Mikel Arteta, Guardiola’s assistant at City is also in the race to become the manager of the London club. The talks between the club chiefs and Arteta have intensified and the Spaniard looks set to take over the reins at the Emirates and it saw Guardiola admit that it might be a job too hard. The Spaniard also added that Arsene Wenger raised the club to another level and getting back to that bracket might be harder than the club thinks.

“I think Arsenal always one of the best teams of the last 20 years. When Arsene took over the team, he raised the club to another level and now they are struggling a little bit the last years. When the club takes a decision to replace the manager or buy players it’s always to rise to be better. Whether it’s going to happen or not, I don’t know. You know my opinion about Mikel. He’s a professional human being and a person, I don’t have doubts about that,” said the former Barcelona manager to Goal.

“Mikel was honest with me. Arsenal - we were there two days ago. They were talking with our sporting director, the CEO and didn’t say anything. I don’t know if the meeting was at one at night because they didn’t want to make it public, but in the end, it was public. I think Arsenal want to do the best thing possible. Sometimes it’s not easy to handle this kind of situation. We cannot deny that all the clubs around the world make behind the scenes the first contact to try to avoid the clubs that are in charge. All I can say from what I’m concerned about is that Mikel was clear with me and that’s all. Perhaps there is a problem with the chairmen and the CEOs - they have to talk to each other,” concluded the Spanish boss.