Arsenal manager Unai Emery feels that Nicolas Pepe needs to adapt quickly so that he can put in better performances for the club.
The Ivorian attacker had a fine 18/19 season with Lille, netting 23 goals and providing 12 assists. This eventually led to Arsenal signing for a club-record transfer fee of £72 million according to Sky Sports.
So far, the 24-year-old has put in some decent performances but hasn’t had much of an impact for the Gunners. He provided his first assist of the season in Arsenal’s Europa League fixture against Eintracht Frankfurt earlier this week.
Emery feels that Pepe has been playing well but he needs to adapt quickly in order put in better performances for the Gunners. As quoted by Goal.com, the Spaniard said: “He needs more adaptation. He is playing good but progressively we know there is going to be more performance in him to help us and I want to do now quickly the last step in the adaptation for us, for example, against Aston Villa. We are working with him first for that adaptation.
“After the training now we are watching individual videos with him, also to push him to achieve the details tactically we need for him because he is playing well but also we need in our organisation to be strong with every player to improve a lot.”
Adapting to the Premier League after spending 6-7 years in France isn’t rocket science and it might take some time for Pepe to showcase his full potential for Arsenal. He provided his first assist for the Gunners this week and maybe his maiden goal is not very far away.
Pepe will most likely feature in today’s fixture against Aston Villa and he’ll be expected to produce a strong performance as Arsenal will hope to get three points.
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