{"id":1177,"date":"2026-04-17T14:46:13","date_gmt":"2026-04-17T14:46:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/socialsport.online\/?p=1177"},"modified":"2026-04-17T14:46:13","modified_gmt":"2026-04-17T14:46:13","slug":"mikel-were-going-to-prepare-the-game-to-win-quotes-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/socialsport.online\/?p=1177","title":{"rendered":"Mikel: \u201cWe\u2019re going to prepare the game to win\u201d | Quotes | News"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n<\/p>\n

\n

Mikel Arteta has his heart set on one objective only – win at the Etihad Stadium on Sunday.<\/p>\n

We go into this huge Premier League fixture away to Manchester City six points clear at the top of the table so, while a draw would prevent Pep Guardiola\u2019s side from closing the gap on us, the opportunity to go nine points clear is an irresistible prospect.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s the point our manager made in his pre-match press conference at the Sobha Realty Training Centre on Friday, where he refused to entertain the idea of settling for a point apiece.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have earned the right to be in this position, to be challenging and with the possibility to win and the opportunity to win on Sunday, arguably against the best team and the best manager that this league has ever seen,\u201d he said. \u201cThat’s a huge privilege, and we cannot wait to play the game. We’re going to prepare the game to win it, that’s for sure, and we see that as a big opportunity for us.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not going to spend one second talking about that (drawing). We prepare every game to win, that’s where we are and we’re going to continue to do the same.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n

\n Read more<\/span> <\/p>\n

From the vault: Five great wins at Man City <\/span>
\n <\/h3>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n<\/article>\n

Mikel was then asked about how important our mindset and mentality is going to be for such a significant game in the title race.<\/p>\n

\u201cI mean, our team has to give us every tool, every element that we need to go and win it,\u201d he said. \u201cWe will have a very, very strong opponent; we know that in front of us. We’ve been doing it for nine months in every context, we have played a lot of games against them, and we know what we have to do.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think (mentality is) a big part of that. I mean, everything plays a part in a match. Technique as well, obviously, because without that there is nothing. But there is obviously a huge part to play in that sense and we have improved a lot in that area. We will have to show it on Sunday again, that’s for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n

In Guardiola\u2019s pre-match press conference, the Man City manager insisted that the title race is over for them should we come away from Manchester with all three points.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know there are six games to go,\u201d Mikel responded. \u201cObviously it’s a really important one for both teams and it will incline the balance a little bit.\u00a0Winning a game in the Premier League is so tough for everybody,\u00a0so after this one there will be still some very difficult matches for all of us\u00a0and we’ll have to wait and continue to see what happens.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that (tension) has to be the vitamin for everybody.\u00a0In whatever we do, that’s going to be what elevates us to be better\u00a0and to strive to be better, to have more hunger, more desire to do it\u00a0but never in a negative way.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Copyright 2026 The Arsenal Football Club Limited. Permission to use quotations from this article is granted subject to appropriate credit being given to www.arsenal.com as the source.<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mikel Arteta has his heart set on one objective only<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1178,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1177","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arsenal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/socialsport.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1177","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/socialsport.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/socialsport.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/socialsport.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/socialsport.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1177"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/socialsport.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1177\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/socialsport.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1178"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/socialsport.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1177"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/socialsport.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1177"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/socialsport.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1177"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}