Shkodran Mustafi has been a constant problem for Arsenal this season and against Chelsea, the German gave yet another poor performance which resulted in David Luiz being shown a straight red.
And now that the manager is trying to bring in a new central defender this month, there have been rumours that Mustafi could be sold off by Arsenal before the transfer window shuts down at the end of this week.
But now speaking about the defender, Arteta has come out to make it clear that Shkodran Mustafi very much remains in the plans for the remainder of the season.
Arteta said as quoted by The Metro: ‘When he is my player and when he is training with me the way he does every day, of course.
‘The plans maybe in the summer were different with him. I came here, he is here and his attitude is always right and he wants to help.
‘Yes he made a mistake, but it’s OK. I like more the reaction and I look more at the reaction.
‘I don’t believe that at 27 you cannot improve certain aspects of the game; I really believe you can.
‘I work with players like this and I have team-mates like this and there is always a moment where there is a click.
‘I can accept a mistake, no problem. What I’m not going to accept is somebody makes a mistake and after he stops playing, and he doesn’t want the ball and doesn’t want to make decisions. That player is not acceptable for our team.
‘But Musti after that [mistake], he tried to play every single time, he went for every single challenge and put his body on the line. He was down afterwards but he reacted and if he does that, he will overcome the situation.
‘I ask him to play the way we want to play. He makes a mistake, another day it will be someone else.
‘Obviously we want to minimise that as quick as possible and find the reason why that happens, but I like his reaction after that.’
Arsenal have lost Calum Chambers to an injury for the rest of the season which is why we don’t think the manager will not risk parting ways with Shkodran Mustafi this month.
But surely once the 2019-20 campaign comes to an end, the 27-year-old will be shown the door during the summer transfer window.
