Martin Keown thinks Mikel Arteta made a great decision for Arsenal this week

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Arsenal legend Martin Keown has praised Mikel Arteta for a tactical change he made in the midweek Europa League victory, in conversation with BT Sport.

Mikel Arteta’s charges were in last-32 first-leg action away at Olympiakos, but it was a tricky night for the Gunners and the deadlock was not broken until nine minutes from time.

Bukayo Saka connected with Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang’s pass and played the ball across the six-yard box for Alexandre Lacazette to slam home from close range.

At half time, some Arsenal fans lamented the team’s lack of creativity on Twitter.

Fellow BT Sport pundit Robin van Persie also said Joe Willock, Matteo Guendouzi and Granit Xhaka weren’t capable of delivering a good enough final ball towards the forwards.

However, Arteta acted accordingly by replacing Willock and Gabriel Martinelli with Nicolas Pepe and Dani Ceballos in the second half, which saw Guendouzi drop deeper.

“Apart from the United game, [Arteta] has not seen a complete 90 minutes from Arsenal,” Keown told BT Sport – as quoted by the Daily Star – at full time. “In the last 15-20 minutes, he made that change: Aubameyang going out to the left and Pepe out out the right.

“I thought they couldn’t control midfield until Ceballos came on and Guendouzi sat deep, with Willock at the top of that midfield three. They changed the shape and got a lot more creative and got the goal that they deserved and maybe could have got another one.”

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It was clear to see that Arsenal lacked creativity in the first half, a bad call made by Arteta in terms of his starting XI selection, but credit to him, he put things right, steered the Gunners to a win, and has been praised for it.

It’s still early days for the Spaniard but he is certainly starting to get to grips with the job at hand, and once he gets a full summer to put his stamp on the team, offload the players he doesn’t want and bring in his own personnel, there could be an exciting 2020-21 season in store for the Gunners faithful.