Jamie Carragher: You can make an argument that Unai Emery is the third best manager in this Premier League. If you back over the last 12 months since he came in at Villa, if you are talking about Man Utd, Aston Villa are a better coached team than United. There is no doubt about that.
For a club the size of Villa, I think there is a really strong argument for Emery being the third best manager.
However, the comparison with Arteta is too easy to make and it doesn’t seem he could rebuild a club in his image like Arteta has done and like United need to do
it doesn’t seem he could rebuild a club in his image like Arteta has done and like United need to do
Based on what? He was giving basically a season and a half at Arsenal, it took Arteta 3 to rebuild the squad. He finished 8th twice in the same time Emery was given there with basically the same squad?
Mourinho also struggled to rebuild United but he had arguably two of the best rebuilds in history at Chelsea and Real.
There was not as clear a style of play as Arteta has. Emery relied on individual brilliance from Aubameyang and Özil more than Arteta relies on individual brilliance.
As for your point about back to back 8th place finishes. That’s very bad faith. Emery was more responsible for that first 8th place finish than Arteta was. He got 18 points off 13 games, 1.38 points per game, as opposed to 33 points in 20 games, 1.65 ppg.
Also, Emery was getting worse and worse at Arsenal. He started amazingly before bottling Champions League in his first season and then having an awful start to the season.
Arteta’s first 12 months was awful but after 12 months, they just kept improving and improving with a clear plan, style of play and a positive spiral as opposed to the negative one with Emery. Only Manchester City got more points in their last 24 games of that season than Arteta’s Arsenal.
This means his first 34 games as a manager were awful but after that, he got very good results.
He was given only a season and a half because after a strong start where the football did not pass the eye test but delivered results, eventually things evened out and we bottled a 4th place finish in his first season. After that we were playing the worst football I have ever witnessed Arsenal play, and were in the bottom half of the table by the time he was sacked in his second season. Arteta took over and immediately made the team play better, moved us a couple of spots up in the table to finish 8th and won an FA cup.
I don’t blame him for everything as there was too much shit going on at the club when he was there, but he really did not do that well for Arsenal, it was just not a good fit.
It depends on how you judge managers.
For a club the size of Villa, I think there is a really strong argument for Emery being the third best manager.
However, the comparison with Arteta is too easy to make and it doesn’t seem he could rebuild a club in his image like Arteta has done and like United need to do
Based on what? He was giving basically a season and a half at Arsenal, it took Arteta 3 to rebuild the squad. He finished 8th twice in the same time Emery was given there with basically the same squad?
Mourinho also struggled to rebuild United but he had arguably two of the best rebuilds in history at Chelsea and Real.
There was not as clear a style of play as Arteta has. Emery relied on individual brilliance from Aubameyang and Özil more than Arteta relies on individual brilliance.
As for your point about back to back 8th place finishes. That’s very bad faith. Emery was more responsible for that first 8th place finish than Arteta was. He got 18 points off 13 games, 1.38 points per game, as opposed to 33 points in 20 games, 1.65 ppg.
Also, Emery was getting worse and worse at Arsenal. He started amazingly before bottling Champions League in his first season and then having an awful start to the season.
Arteta’s first 12 months was awful but after 12 months, they just kept improving and improving with a clear plan, style of play and a positive spiral as opposed to the negative one with Emery. Only Manchester City got more points in their last 24 games of that season than Arteta’s Arsenal.
This means his first 34 games as a manager were awful but after that, he got very good results.
He was given only a season and a half because after a strong start where the football did not pass the eye test but delivered results, eventually things evened out and we bottled a 4th place finish in his first season. After that we were playing the worst football I have ever witnessed Arsenal play, and were in the bottom half of the table by the time he was sacked in his second season. Arteta took over and immediately made the team play better, moved us a couple of spots up in the table to finish 8th and won an FA cup.
I don’t blame him for everything as there was too much shit going on at the club when he was there, but he really did not do that well for Arsenal, it was just not a good fit.