The winger returns to north London after a season on loan at Nice (Picture: Getty)
Nicolas Pepe has confirmed he will return to Arsenal in the coming days after spending last season out on loan and has dismissed claims he has a poor relationship with manager Mikel Arteta.
The Ivory Coast international moved to north London in a club-record £72million deal from Lille in 2019 but struggled to live up to that price tag and was eventually sent out on loan to Nice last year, where he scored six times in an injury hampered campaign.
Nice declined to turn Pepe’s loan stay into a permanent move and he will therefore return to parent club Arsenal, with pre-season training set to begin next week.
The 28-year-old is still expected to be offloaded this summer, but Pepe has suggested he is willing to fight for his place with the Gunners and insists he has a good relationship with Arteta despite some previous frustrations over a lack of playing time.
‘I will return to Arsenal. I was loaned without an option to buy so I have to go back to Arsenal,’ Pepe told YouTube channel Colinterview.
‘I don’t know [about my future] yet. When I get back, I’ll speak with the coach and everyone and see what everyone’s ideas are and then we’ll make a decision.’
On his relationship with Arteta, he continued: ‘People say that he identified me as a player that wasn’t up to the level in his team, in his philosophy. It’s completely false.
‘When he arrived, he had Manchester City’s philosophy. He had a squad that was filled with quality and backups in every position. When he spoke to me, he said he counted on me, he wanted me to do this or that, and you have to focus on that.
Pepe says he learned a lot working under Arteta (Picture: Getty)
‘He improved me in every way. He spoke to me the whole time, I watched videos with his assistants all the time. He really believed in me. He said I had incredible potential, so we need to extract that potential.
‘At the end of the first season, he spoke with me and told me to do this or that. The second season comes along, I was a substitute. I was going mad. How could I be a substitute when he said he counted on me? Everything is spinning in your head.
‘I was a substitute for [what felt like] 10 matches. It was at the time when they signed Willian. He is a number 10 or a winger. But he plays on the wing for like 11 or 12 matches in a row. My head turned, knowing that I had spoken with the coach and it wasn’t like that.
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‘But that improved in the sense that he gave me a chance, I scored against Sheffield United at the Emirates. The confidence started to come back. I started to speak better, but it was a bit cold. I started to speak to agents, but we didn’t see each other like before. But it improved.
‘It’s not true that he labelled me. Not true at all. He helped me in every way, on a tactical level, in terms of game intelligence because his philosophy requires a lot of intelligence.
‘He knew my style of play wasn’t waiting in possession, it was cutting inside, it wasn’t waiting out on the right. Before, I was a bit freer. I had to wait in my zone, and I wasn’t like that before. These are parts of my game that he tried to improve. He always wanted to help me with all of that.’
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‘He improved me in every way… he really believed in me!’