Petit played a similar role for Arsenal in the late 1990s, helping the club to a Premier League title and an FA Cup triumph.
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Arsenal signing Granit Xhaka has earned rave reviews for his early showings in England and Arsene Wenger has admitted the midfielder already reminds him of Emmanuel Petit.
The Arsenal boss made it clear that he wanted to sign only three new members to the first-team squad, and Xhaka, Mustafi and Lucas Perez appear to be it, although Rob Holding has played every minute of our campaign this far following the injury losses.
Arsene Wenger brought in Granit Xhaka before Euro 2016, but for the last few months he has failed to make a big splash, as Manchester United, Manchester City and Chelsea bulked up ahead of the coming season.
‘He is a guy who plays naturally behind the ball.
‘He likes to sit, give good long balls and be available with the centre-backs.
“We tried already in December past year, ” Wenger replied when asked when he decided he wanted to sign Xhaka.
“He is 24 years old, he has already experience overseas and (getting that) is always a problem. That is not a small club, so he has leadership qualities”. The next two will be very important for us.
When asked if there would be any other new arrivals before the transfer window closes on Wednesday evening, Wenger replied: “I don’t think so. We had two hard away games (against Leicester City and Watford) but today I believe we had a good, solid performance”, Wenger said.
Kaboul, the former Tottenham and Sunderland defender, endured a torrid Watford debut, but is confident things will improve. He can be very tough. Their clever movement and interplay quickly unpicked Walter Mazzarri’s game plan, to the extent that Watford’s manager had to switch from 3-5-2 to 4-4-2 shortly after half-time, by which time Arsenal had taken a three-goal lead and effectively won the game.
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Watford captain Troy Deeney is confident his team will respond following their 3-1 defeat to Arsenal on Saturday.
