Arsenal flop Nicolas Pepe has slammed Mikel Arteta for going back on his promises, with his Gunners career all but over.
Pepe became Arsenal's record signing when he was bought from Lille for £72million but has failed to live up to that price tag. Having scored just 16 Premier League goals in his first three years at the Emirates Stadium, Pepe was shipped out on loan to Nice in the season just gone.
He again failed to live up to expectations though, making only 19 appearances in Ligue 1 as Nice could only finish ninth. It has been quite the fall from grace for the winger, but he has now extraordinarily hit out at Arteta for his treatment of him.
Pepe will almost certainly be on the move again this summer, with little hope of a future back at the Emirates. Any lingering hope has likely been burned by Pepe's outburst, in which he slammed the Arsenal boss.
“People say that he identified me as a player that wasn’t up to the level in his team, in his philosophy. It’s completely false. When he arrived, he had (Manchester) City’s philosophy. He had a squad that was filled with quality and backups in every position," he told Colinterview.
"When he spoke to me, he said he counted on me, he wanted me to do this or that, and you have to focus on that. He improved me in every way. He spoke to me the whole time, I watched videos with his assistants all the time. He really believed in me.
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"He said I had incredible potential, so we need to extract that potential. At the end of the first season, he spoke with me and told me to do this or that. The second season comes along, I was a substitute. I was going mad.
"How could I be a substitute when he said he counted on me? Everything is spinning in your head. I was a substitute. It was at the time when they signed Willian. He is a number 10 or a winger. But he plays on the wing for like 11 or 12 matches in a row."
Despite taking aim at Arteta, Pepe has also admitted that the Arsenal boss did try to help him to improve. But he admitted that he struggled to adapt to the style of play Arteta has brought in at the Gunners.
"My head turned, knowing that I had spoken with the coach and it wasn’t like that. But that improved in the sense that he gave me a chance, I scored against Sheffield United at the Emirates. The confidence started to come back," Pepe added.
"I started to speak better, but it was a bit cold. I started to speak to agents, but we didn’t see each other like before. But it improved. It’s not true that he labelled me. Not true at all. He helped me in every way, on a tactical level, in terms of game intelligence.
"His philosophy requires a lot of intelligence. He knew my style of play wasn’t waiting in possession, it was cutting inside, it wasn’t waiting out on the right. Before, I was a bit freer. I had to wait in my zone, and I wasn’t like that before. These are parts of my game that he tried to improve. He always wanted to help me with all of that."
