Arsenal fans have taken to Twitter to react after spotting how Mikel Arteta reacted to a touch from Nicolas Pepe during the 1-0 win over Norwich.
What’s the story?
Well, Arsenal have released their touchline footage from the 1-0 win on Saturday, their first Premier League victory of the season.
In the footage, we see one moment where Ben White hits a wonderful pass out to Pepe on the right flank, where a good touch would isolate him with one Norwich defender inside the box.
However, the £72m man takes quite a clunky touch, which bounces away from the box and allows a few Norwich defenders to get back.
When this happens, footage clearly shows an agitated Arteta spinning his arm around on the touchline, gesturing for Pepe to speed things up a bit.
In the end, the 81st minute moment shows the Ivory Coast international cutting inside and ballooning a shot well over the crossbar.
Will Nicolas Pepe survive at Arsenal under Mikel Arteta?
It never really seems as if Pepe has taken to life under Arteta.
The 26-year-old has scored 21 goals in 74 games under the Spaniard, although it still feels like Arteta isn’t happy with him.
As seen in the footage, Arteta is a perfectionist, while Pepe still has plenty of rough edges to his game – clearly, this isn’t an ideal situation.
For example, the touch wasn’t awful. It got the ball under control, and gave Pepe a chance to shoot.
However, Arteta clearly wants dynamism, and for every touch to matter.
It’s something he will have to coach into the Ivorian at London Colney.
Having said that, the pair have worked together for a while now, so you’d expect this issue to already be ironed out.
For now, let’s see what the Arsenal fans on Twitter have been saying about Arteta’s reaction to Pepe’s touch…
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