Thierry Henry laughs at Arsenal chances in Man City title showdown: ‘It’s easy to talk’ | OneFootball

Thierry Henry has told Mikel Arteta that he wants Arsenal to rediscover their ‘fire’ when they head to Manchester City for their Premier League title showdown on Sunday, fearing they face embarrassment if they don’t.

The Gunners booked their place in the Champions League semi-finals after a lifeless 0-0 draw with Sporting on Wednesday evening in what was another unconvincing display from Arteta’s side.

Despite advancing to face Atletico Madrid in the last four, the recent results against City in the Carabao Cup final, Southampton in the FA Cup and Bournemouth in the league have done little to show that Arsenal can come away from The Etihad with a positive outcome.

Indeed, if Pep Guardiola’s side do triumph on Sunday and then win their game, they will be on level points with the Gunners, who finished as Premier League runners-up for the last three seasons.

And, when asked what he wants to see from his former side in the crunch clash, Henry referred back to Arteta’s unhinged press conference ahead of the Sporting game, in which he demanded “fire” from his players.

“I want to see that fire at the Etihad,” Henry told CBS Sports. “That’s what I want to see, it’s easy to talk, go there, at Man City, and deliver.

“I believe in what I see though, I believe in him Arteta, ‘the fire’, but when you talk like that you have to do it then. I didn’t see that tonight.

“We are through, so happy, semi-final, I never won it, but I won the league though, go and win at Man City, I want to see that fire there, I believe Mikel, yes, but show it.”

Asked how he would approach the game against City, Henry replied: “Not like tonight, or against Bournemouth, or Brighton away, or Mansfield, or everything that I’ve seen this season.”

Henry wants more from Arsenal

As for whether the performance against Sporting would be enough to beat City, Henry laughed and replied: “The Man City I’ve seen recently? We’re talking about the team that won four in a row, Liverpool came in between that if not it would have been more.

“I do believe, I’ve been saying since the beginning of the season, this year I do believe we can win the league, this is the biggest chance in your life just to prove to yourself, as a team, that we can.

“And then people will not talk about the word they want to use that I do not want to use.

“I do believe personally but I am sitting in a chair for CBS, there’s nothing I can do. Now I heard ‘fire’, I want to see that fire at the Etihad.

“If you have the face of Declan Rice go back to that, at the end of the game I stayed with his face, you had a lot of guys smiling but his face… I don’t know, maybe I need to speak to him to know what he had in his head. This is a guy who just went through to the semi-final of the Champions League.

“There’s no positive or negative here. We are in a semi-final of a Champions League, well done, that didn’t happen a lot in history so obviously I’m over the moon. But City… I want the team to win there, not draw, statement.”