Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang opens up on his side of conflict with Mikel Arteta | OneFootball

In a wide-ranging interview with Colinterview, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang (34) has revealed his side of an altercation with Mikel Arteta that saw his time at Arsenal come to an early end.

Aubameyang joined Arsenal in 2018 midway through Arsene Wenger’s final season at the club from Borussia Dortmund for a £56 million fee. In his first full campaign for The Gunners, the Gabonese striker shared the Golden Boot with Sadio Mané (32) and Mohamed Salah (31) after he scored 22 goals.

However, his form took a nosedive in his final season at the club in the 2021/22 season, with the player admitting that he struggled with depression around the health of his parents, while a series of disciplinary matters, such as arriving late for the North London Derby, culminated in the incident which saw Arteta sideline his captain for good.

Now playing for Olympique de Marseille, Aubameyang was willing to open up on what he believed was an unfair decision from his then-manager. The forward explained that he was provided time off after a game against Everton, which he used to collect his mum from France and bring her back to England for the Christmas holidays.

She had suffered a stroke a few months before and he had been worried about her. However, he was delayed in his return because he was taking his mother to her doctor appointments, which meant he arrived the morning after he was supposed to come back from France impeding the club’s COVID protocol at the time.

As Aubameyang explains it, “I arrive, the coach finishes his meeting and then he grabs me and he completely tears into me. He’s totally tearing me apart, screaming at me. He says: ‘You stabbed me in the back. You can’t do this given all we’re going through.’ At that point, I tell myself that I’m not going to answer him because it’s going to become bad.”

“I didn’t go out drinking… He knows exactly why I left. At the time I didn’t know why he was lecturing me so much.” It was an episode that signalled the end of the Gabonese striker at the club. The relationship between the manager and the player was completely broken with the forward never playing again for the club, and midway through the season, Aubameyang forced a transfer from Arsenal to Barcelona.

GFFN | Nick Hartland