Mikel Arteta jokes Arsenal duo 'sharing house and wives' after on-pitch spat
Mikel Arteta has played down the spat between Ben White and Oleksandr Zinchenko after Arsenal’s win at Nottingham Forest, joking that they’ve been living together and "sharing wives".
White and Zinchenko were caught on camera arguing after the full-time whistle at the City Ground on Tuesday night and had to be pulled apart by team-mates and staff.
Arteta insisted after the 2-1 win at Forest that he “loved” the row and attempted to make light of the situation during his press conference on Friday ahead of Sunday’s huge game with Liverpool.
When asked if White and Zinchenko were now friends again, Arteta joked: “Yeah… they’ve been in the same house the past few days sharing wives and everything! It’s fine, they’re living together now. They’re best mates.
“You don’t argue with someone if you don’t have a great relationship. That happens because you have the trust and chemistry with somebody to react the way they did.”
Arteta insisted he has no issues with his players having disagreements, as long as any conversations are done in an amicable way.
“I love it,” he said. “As long as it’s in a respectful way and with the intention to be more demanding as a team and it stays there, I’m very happy with that.
“Maybe we have a different understanding of what the word fight means. Maybe it was a conversation. A little bit heated and a little bit emotional after the game when you are going 200 beats a minute. It's normal. Nothing new.
“I want to see passion. I want to see commitment from my players. I want players who always have desire to be better and in order to do that we have to be demanding with each other. Otherwise it is Disneyland.”