Mikel Arteta helped turn Raheem Sterling into a penalty-box threat – he can do it again at Arsenal

“My time with Raheem was exceptional. We built a really strong relationship together.”

Mikel Arteta had only good words to say about Raheem Sterling when questioned about their time together at Manchester City this month. Now, after Arsenal agreed a loan deal with Chelsea for Sterling late on transfer deadline day, the player and coach will work as colleagues once more.

At City, Arteta coached a vastly different Sterling between July 2016 and December 2019. However, there is belief that a reunion could help Sterling rediscover his best form and give Arteta his first Premier League title as a manager.

It is easy to brush away the impact Arteta had during his stint at City given the presence of serial winner Pep Guardiola. But in 2020, before Arteta’s first match at the Etihad as Arsenal manager, Sterling revealed the extent of belief Guardiola placed in his compatriot.

“Arteta had a lot of say here. The manager trusted him and he had a lot of influence on the players as well,” Sterling said, adding that Arteta would “put his foot down” with the players and “not let things slide”.

Arsenal’s systematic squad trimming in the Arteta era vindicates Sterling’s words, and the club have benefited from their manager’s no-nonsense approach — something that has seen them improve their points tally in each of the past four seasons.

Arteta will expect the same high standards from Sterling, who will know precisely what those demands will be.

During Arteta’s City stint, Sterling grew into a regular goalscorer, having burst onto the scene as a pacy winger with inconsistent end product at Liverpool. A key feature of his improvement had to do with improved positioning and movement, which saw him regularly attack the box.

The graph below provides an idea of how Sterling’s dribbling took a backseat as his game evolved during his time at City. Additionally, his carries into the penalty area increased from 2.7 per 90 minutes to 3.1 as he operated closer to the box.

Sterling’s improved positioning also meant he was a bigger threat in the box, receiving passes and taking his shots from better areas. His non-penalty expected goals (npxG) hit a career-high 0.6 per 90 in 2019-20, while those three seasons were also the best of his career for shooting stats.

Sterling ended up scoring 55 league goals across those three campaigns from a npxG of 45.4. Many of those goals — as well as the 23 Premier League goals he managed in his final two seasons at City — came from him making intelligent runs…

… or combining those off-ball runs with excellent positioning to score from cutbacks and crosses.

From a productivity standpoint, Sterling may never again be quite as good as he was in that spell but his goalscoring was more to do with instinct than ability. Rekindling that instinct, which most will tell you is easier to do in training than restoring an ability, will be the first order of business for Arteta.

Before diving into the Arsenal angle, it is important to understand what the current iteration of Sterling offers.

Having arrived from a hyper-stable environment at Manchester City, Chelsea’s volatility has meant he had to adapt his game to four permanent managers in two years. Sterling has looked more like the player who burst onto the scene with Liverpool, leaning more on his dribbling to fashion opportunities. However, teams have found it easier to stop him, due to a drop in his acceleration and the fact that he plays in a Chelsea side without a defined identity.

The 29-year-old averaged 6.0 take-ons per 90 in the league last season, but his 34 per cent success rate was the worst of his career. Sterling’s 9.9 progressive passes received per 90 across his Chelsea stint falls well short of the figures from his City spell. He still gets into good positions but is not being found with the regularity and precision that he was at the Etihad.

His finishing — which has never been his strongest trait due to a tendency to underhit most of his shots — and decision-making suffered as well, with moments like these leaving Chelsea fans frustrated last season. It is worth noting, though, that his movement to get on to the end of some of these chances was still excellent.

Sterling has regressed in virtually every statistical category mentioned in this article. Some of that is due to the way he has had to adapt his game to fit tactical demands at Chelsea, a few are due to his limitations as he approaches his thirties.

So where does that leave him?

Sterling’s dribbling is statistically his standout quality once again but given the turbulence at Chelsea, it may be premature to pigeonhole him into that category of Premier League forwards.

Arteta’s experience of coaching Sterling should help make the teething stages of this partnership straightforward. From there on, there are ways in which Arteta can both embrace and improve Arsenal’s latest signing.

For starters, Sterling’s one-versus-one ability and comfort in playing with underlapping and overlapping full-backs mean he offers more tactical flexibility than Gabriel Martinelli, who was not at his best last season. Summer signing Riccardo Calafiori showed at Bologna that he can drift into midfield but also hold his width and playing him alongside Sterling on the left could maximise the returns Arsenal expect from both players.

If Arteta can get Sterling to frequently make off-ball runs into the box and target the back post once again, Sterling will likely respond with goals. Arsenal created more chances from cutbacks than any other Premier League side last season (91) and scored the third-most goals via that method (12), so if Sterling gets into the right places at the right time, he could score at his Manchester City rate once more.

The move also has implications from a squad-building point of view. Having Sterling and Martinelli as left-wing options gives Leandro Trossard the freedom to play in his preferred position down the middle and improves Arsenal’s depth at centre-forward alongside Kai Havertz and Gabriel Jesus without additional expenditure. Lastly, Sterling’s versatility means he could also serve as backup to Bukayo Saka, especially with Reiss Nelson set to spend the season on loan at Fulham.

Throughout his career, Sterling has adapted to changing managers, demands, positions and tactics with varying levels of success. History has shown that managerial stability and structure bring out the best in the forward, so Arsenal being able to resurrect the ‘strong relationship’ between Sterling and Arteta could prove a promising element as they try and overhaul Guardiola at the top of the Premier League.

(Photo: Marc Atkins/Getty Images))