Former Arsenal ace Matteo Guendouzi has opened up on his admiration for the ‘amazing’ Unai Emery amid reports suggesting that the duo could be reunited in the Premier League with Aston Villa.
It spoke volumes about how highly Unai Emery rated a relatively little-known teenager he signed from FC Lorient that the Spaniard appeared to have no qualms about throwing 19-year-old Matteo Guendouzi straight in at the deep end during their respective debut seasons at the Emirates Stadium.
The poodle-haired Frenchman even started each of Arsenal’s first five Premier League games of 2018/19.
And, five years on, Guendouzi remains indebted to the role the now-Aston Villa boss played in his rapid rise to the pinnacle of European football, with reports indicating that player and coach could be reunited in the Midlands at some point in the near future.
Is an Aston Villa reunion on the cards?
“I was lucky to work under Unai Emery. He was an amazing manager,” Guendouzi tells The Athletic. “He’s now doing a top job with Aston Villa.
“He gave me the confidence to play, so I was very lucky to work with him.”
The £15 million-rated Guendouzi is now a Marseille player, albeit spending the season on loan at Lazio. Fabrizio Romano claimed back in 2023 that Emery – such is his admiration for the swashbuckling playmaker – would relish a reunion at Villa Park, though that was before the claret-and-blue boss snapped up Youri Tielemans on a free transfer.
Guendouzi, meanwhile, insists that he would not change anything about his Arsenal career, even if his time at the Emirates ended in disappointment following a fall-out with Mikel Arteta.
Matteo Guendouzi hails Unai Emery influence
“I have no regrets about what I did at Arsenal,” the seven-time France international adds. “I was 19 (when I arrived) and I went on to play 85 games in two years. 85 games for a big club like Arsenal is a lot.
“I tried to give my best for the club. In my first season, we finished fifth, just one point behind the Champions League places, and we lost in the Europa League final. When you finish fifth in England, it’s like second or third in other leagues.
“England is very competitive, even with the teams at the bottom; it’s maybe the biggest league in the world because every game is very, very difficult. I am very happy about what I did there.
“The next season we won the FA Cup. I was so young, I played a lot, I was very happy with this. I learnt a lot with great players. Mesut Ozil was the best, an amazing player with the ball — he sees things you would never see in your life.”
HITC Football understands that Aston Villa, who prioritised youth and potential in January, are likely to do the same in the summer. Teenagers Michael Kayode and Roony Bardghji, of Fiorentina and Copenhagen respectively, are on the radar.
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