Mikel Arteta warned Arsenal will go nowhere until he solves major transfer issue

Mikel Arteta reviews Brighton defeat

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Mikel Arteta won’t be able to achieve success at Arsenal until he signs a top goalscoring striker, according to former Aston Villa forward Tony Cascarino. Arsenal star Alexandre Lacazette has just four Premier League goals to his name this season and Cascarino says that is far from being enough.

Lacazette did not start the season as the first-choice striker for Arteta. That role was handed to Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.

However, the Gabon star’s falling out with Arteta saw him stripped of the captaincy and then leave the club in the January window. Lacazette has taken over the armband as well as the mantle of the main forward at the Emirates.

But the Frenchman has not scored a goal from open play in over 19 hours of football. Arsenal are still in the hunt for a Champions League qualification spot this season.

But Cascarino says there is no chance of any success for Arteta until his striker issue is resolved in the transfer market. He said on talkSPORT: “Lacazette is probably the lowest-scoring centre-forward.

“He’s got four Premier League goals this season. Obviously he’s been in and out of the team at times, but he’s played 25 games in the Premier League now and he’s got four goals.

“Lacazette is an issue that he’s got his contract up in the summer and that’s an area they need to fill. You can’t do anything in football when you’ve got a centre-forward who’s got four, five, six goals in a season.”

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Arteta was asked about Lacazette’s form following Saturday’s 2-1 loss to Brighton. But he did not want to speak individually about the 30-year-old.

Arteta said: “We need to score more goals, that’s for sure and that’s a collective issue.” He was then asked if he was happy with Lacazette’s performance.

The Spaniard replied: “I’m never happy when I lose, I’m really upset. I cannot be happy.”

Speaking about the performance in general, Arteta admitted there was no improvement from last Monday’s loss at Crystal Palace. He added: “The first half was really poor again.

“The reaction that we wanted to show and everything that we talked about, we didn’t make it happen on the pitch. We were sloppy with the ball, we were second best again in a lot of situations, we didn’t show any purpose or build any momentum in the game, play with the right speed and transform the game that Brighton proposed today and with the first chance that they had, the only chance I think they had, they scored a goal and, again, we created a cold atmosphere, an atmosphere we weren’t comfortable with and when we tried to change it, it was too late.”

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