Former Arsenal star Sead Kolasinac has lavished praise on Mikel Arteta ahead of his Atalanta side facing the Gunners in Bergamo on Thursday night.
Arsenal are preparing to open their Champions League campaign this week when they will take on Atalanta at the renovated Gewiss Stadium in Bergamo.
The game will also mark the occasion of Kolasinac playing against his former side and manager while wearing the Atalanta colours for the first time.
The Bosnian defender spent five years at Arsenal and worked under Arteta at the Emirates before leaving the club for Marseille in January 2022.
Arsenal have come a long way since then and challenged Manchester City for the Premier League title in the last two seasons under Arteta’s tutelage.
The former Gunner insists ‘extraordinary’ Mikel Arteta still has room to grow
Kolasinac is acutely aware of the Arsenal manager’s work ethic and attention to detail from his time working under him in north London.
He stressed that Arteta is the kind of manager who dedicates every minute of his life to the club and Arsenal are getting the fruits of his hard work over the last season or so.
The defender insisted that the Spaniard is already an extraordinary coach but given how young he is, Arteta is only going to further improve in the coming years with experience.
“I think he’s doing a great job, he tries to put every minute of his time into the club and this is starting to show results”, Kolasinac said in a press conference.
“He’s an extraordinary coach, very young, he still has a lot of room for growth.”
Kolasinac and his Atalanta teammates will hope to give Arteta and his Arsenal side a tough night out in Bergamo on Thursday night.
However, the words of the former Gunner again underlined the importance of the patience Arsenal showed in trusting Arteta while they were going through a tricky period early in his reign.