Mikel Arteta told Arsenal star has 'the Cristiano Ronaldo mentality'

Arsenal defender Takehiro Tomiyasu has a similar mentality to Cristiano Ronaldo, according to the sporting director of Belgian club Sint-Truiden.

The Gunners completed a £17 million deal to sign the Japan international from Bologna on deadline day.

The 22-year-old, who is capable of playing as a right-back or in central defence, has impressed in the three appearances he has made for Mikel Arteta’s side so far.

And Andre Pinto, who oversaw Tomiyasu’s move to Europe in 2018, believes the Arsenal defender has the right attitude to become a hit in the Premier League.

‘What is amazing about Tomi is that he doesn’t accept anything that isn’t success,’ Pinto told Goal.

‘He’s not lucky, nothing for Tomi comes because he’s lucky. He’s just a hard working player.

‘You find a lot of dedicated players, but Tomi has a little bit of the Cristiano Ronaldo mentality in terms of determination, in terms of working hard and in terms of eating healthy.

‘He is the type of player who is never satisfied. He will always continue to work hard to keep developing himself.

‘I worked with our CEO, Takayuki Tateishi, at FC Tokyo so we knew Tomi from Japan.

‘He was 19 at the time and what captured our attention the most was his potential. It’s not every day that you have a player who is 1.88m and has the speed, the physicality and the technique.

‘We believed so much in Tomi that when he came he had an ankle injury and was recovering. Our doctors were saying ‘you can’t sign this player, he is injured’. So our CEO went to the board and said ‘you can take him, I guarantee it’. This is how much confidence we had in Tomi at the time.’

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