Mikel Arteta just said exactly what Eberechi Eze would want to hear

Even though Eberechi Eze started the season playing loads of games for Arsenal, it seems like minutes are a bit harder to come by in these last few weeks.

Obviously , he has still played, but he was playing so much more to start the season, especially when players like Gabriel Martinelli and Martin Odegaard were facing time off the pitch due to one injury or the other.

Eze did have a few really good games playing in that timespan - most notably a win over Tottenham Hotspur, in which he scored a fantastic hat-trick - but Eze was not consistent enough to remain in the starting XI.

The amount of money that Arsenal paid for him made people expect that he would either be a nailed-on starter, or he'd start most games, if not all.

Let's be clear: he is still playing minutes, just not the number of minutes everyone expected him to play at the start of the season.

There was a run of four games in the Premier League where he did not even come off the bench. There have been games where he has come off the bench as of late, but ideally, he would want to play more.

Mikel Arteta just said exactly what Eberechi Eze would want to hear

Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta, who knows this problem arises with many players, talked about the importance of each individual, including those who do not play as much as others.

He said: “There are players that maybe in terms of minutes don't have that much impact, but the impact that they have around the team to bring everybody together, to create that atmosphere, to support the team and to fulfil different roles is critical.”

He obviously did not name Eze, but the Englishman would have been one of the players he was talking about.

In fact, there could be a number of players. Noni Madueke, Gabriel Jesus, and Christian Norgaard are just some of the players alongside Eze who have seen that minutes in the Premier League or the Champions League for Arsenal are hard to come by.

When there is such a deeply talented squad, some players are bound to miss out, and these names have been on the receiving end of that problem this season.

Be that as it may, however, it is clear that Arsenal and Arteta still clearly rely on these players. Maybe not in every game, but these players know their importance and role in the first team, and hopefully, there are more minutes for these players in the future.