The pressure is seemingly mounting on Unai Emery at Arsenal as his side continue to slip up in the hunt for a top-four finish this season.
While the Gunners had the chance to move up to third place in the Premier League table on Monday night, they suffered a 1-0 defeat at Sheffield Utd and squandered an excellent opportunity to put themselves in a commanding position.
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It’s a familiar story in terms of their inability to break back into the top four and compete for major trophies in recent years, and it seems as though question marks are starting to be raised over Emery.
Given Arsenal haven’t kicked on and made significant progress since he replaced Arsene Wenger, albeit they did reach the Europa League final last season, talk of possible successors is seemingly gathering pace.
According to The Sun, the current odds are favouring Mikel Arteta as the favourite to land the Arsenal job if a change is made, while he’s followed by another former Arsenal midfielder in the form of Patrick Vieira.
Both have been gaining experience and developing their coaching skills in roles since hanging up their boots, while current Wolves boss Nuno Espirito Santo is third in the odds table.
The rest of the list provided includes more established coaches such as Massimiliano Allegri, Didier Deschamps and Rafa Benitez, but it firstly remains to be seen if Arsenal choose to make a change, and whether or not they will prioritise a manager with a winning track record or one who buys into the culture and style of play more so.
With such a long way to go in the season, Emery still has time to get them on track and achieving their objectives this year, and so it’s arguably quite unfair that the discussion over his future at the Emirates is even taking place at this stage.
Nonetheless, if they continue to fall short this season, then perhaps there will be genuine questions asked about whether or not he is the right man to lead the Gunners to their targets moving forward.
