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Arteta is making the same mistake Emery did at Arsenal, claims ex-Gunners defender Keown

Mikel Arteta is making the same mistake Unai Emery did at Arsenal, according to Martin Keown, who was unimpressed with the team's latest Premier League outing against Leicester.

Arsenal slipped to 10th in the Premier League table after suffering a 1-0 defeat at home to Leicester on Sunday. A late goal from substitute Jamie Vardy gave the visitors all three points on a night which saw the Gunners struggle to carve out clear opportunities in the final third.

Arteta has made significant changes at Emirates Stadium since succeeding Emery in the dugout last December, but Keown thinks he has been guilty of tinkering with his team too much in recent weeks.

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Emery, who was sacked after 18 months in charge at Arsenal, was criticised for the same reason throughout his tenure, and Keown has urged the current manager to alter his approach in order to avoid a similar fate.

"They keep changing from one system to another and they did this with Emery," former Gunners defender Keown told Stadium Astro. "That’s what I would like to see now, the same pictures, the same triangles, the same movements, the same partnerships, the same relationships.

"If you keep changing it, you don’t find a rhythm, and that’s something that I found in a very successful team. It was like putting an old pair of slippers on for a game. Everything was there. You’d fire it into midfield to Patrick Vieira, into Dennis Bergkamp, [Thierry] Henry into the channel; it was three passes.

"These players now are getting the ball now and it’s jamming a little bit, so I think keep it simple and start building from this team. If this is the way he wants to play, keep with it, and try to put the people in it and get the messages right and work on it.

"It was very static, the front three never really moved from positions, they didn’t make themselves available."

Arteta has, however, delivered the FA Cup while transforming Arsenal into a competitive force once again, and Keown still believes he can take the club forward as long as he reacts positively to any bumps in the road.

"This is a brand new project for the manager. We don’t want to be over-critical," he added. "I believe he’s the right man for the job 100 per cent, super-bright manager and he’s going to have setbacks, it’s how he responds to this now."

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