EPL: I stole Guardiola’s idea – Arteta admits

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EPL: I stole Guardiola’s idea – Arteta admits

Arsenal manager, Mikel Arteta, has admitted that the way he has deployed Oleksandr Zinchenko this season was inspired by Pep Guardiola’s use of Phillip Lahm at Bayern Munich.

Guardiola came up with a tactic that has gone on to help shape Arsenal’s title charge this term.

Lahm, traditionally a right-back, was used in a more central midfield role after the then-Bayern boss hailed him as “the most intelligent player I have ever coached”.

Zinchenko’s efforts this season with the Gunners have produced something similar.

Arteta has explained the origin of the tactical shift.

“It started when I was in Barcelona, we used to play a 3-4-3 diamond and one of the full-backs used to play there.

“But Pep did it at Bayern for the first time with Phillip Lahm and then that was developed at City with many different ways of doing it with different players.

“So that is the great thing, that you can take all the time things from other sports, other coaches to make yourself better,” Arteta said.