Mikel Arteta confident goals will come for ‘exceptional’ Gyökeres

Arsenal’s head coach Mikel Arteta is optimistic that goals will come for exceptional Viktor Gyökeres in the Premier League. Arsenal registered a 2-0 Champions League win over Olympiacos on Wednesday, but the Swedish striker failed to find the back of the net.

The 27-year-old hasn’t scored in the last five matches for the Gunners as he has had frustrating outings. Arteta said Gyökeres is getting better in his performance with every match, and expects the results to follow soon.

“What I sense is that he’s doing better and better things every game,” Arteta said.

“He was denied a few times with blocks, and then he hit the post, but I think overall his performance was exceptional.

“Again, his work was really good, and yeah, we want him to be scoring goals, but if he doesn’t do that, at least to do everything as he’s doing for the team, because he’s helping the team a lot.”

The Gunners face struggling West Ham at home in the Premier League on Saturday, and Arteta believes it would be a golden opportunity for Gyökeres to break his goals drought.

“I don’t know, but hopefully, yes, and hopefully it will be on Saturday [goals for Gyökeres],” Arteta added.

On the other hand, midfielder Martín Zubimendi played the full 90 minutes while making his Champions League debut at Emirates Stadium.

“I’m really happy,” he told the club website. “The atmosphere was amazing. We scored two and kept a clean sheet.

“It was really demanding. We started really well but at the end they pushed a lot in the second half. I think we suffered in some moments where we shouldn’t have.

“We want to keep the momentum and win as many games as possible. We will recover well and prepare for the next game against West Ham.”