Emery on Aubameyang, Pepe, Ceballos and the win

Unai Emery was a happy man as we kicked off the new season with a win and a clean sheet on the road at Newcastle.

Our head coach was asked about the performance, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang’s display, Mesut Ozil, Sead Kolasinac, Nicolas Pepe and more.

Read on for a full transcript of his post-match press conference:

on an away clean sheet in the first game of the season…
But before that, I want to win. I want to win, I want to score and I want to do a clean sheet. Today we won and we did that. The balance offensively and defensively is only taken with the victory. Today, I think, in our 90 minutes we could do that with taking the match very seriously, being very compact and controlling the game with the ball. Also, I think we created chances and we need also to create chances for our strikers and today with Auba we won.

on having many senior defenders missing and the performance of Chambers…
Really, last year for Calum Chambers was a very good year because he played all the matches with Fulham. They played him as centre-back in a three, in a two and they played him as a midfielder. From pre-season, he deserved to play today in the first XI and he was very focused and with Sokratis was also very serious. I want to have very competitive players in each position. With David Luiz, with Holding when he is coming back to help us, with training regularly and playing with the under-23s because he will play again tomorrow. And with Hector Bellerin, one month more. Today we also had Sead out and the injury to Kieran Tierney. I think we can and will want to become stronger defensively, but above all being one offensive team.

on how Mesut and Sead are – and if they could feature against Burnley…
The club is managing that circumstance. We want to be with them as soon as possible and with normality in training and normality to be ready to play. I don’t know now [if they will play next week].

on Aubameyang scoring already…
But we want to start defending with Aubameyang and we want to start attacking with Bernd Leno. We need to create good combinations, good situations, to create chances and after each player has his quality to score, to do the pass, the assist and to do the job defensively. Aubameyang is our scorer, with Lacazette, with Pepe, with Reiss Nelson, with Micki and other players. And really, today I think every player worked very well. He scored, Aubameyang, but I think it was because every player worked together.

on if Aubameyang can improve his goal tally this year…
Yes. Our idea is to continue being one team, mostly offensive. But we need to also take the balance defensively. Today we started well and the next week is going to be another challenge for us. A clean sheet, but first to win and to create a big spirit as a team, a big spirit in the Emirates. To win away we know is difficult in each match. Today we struggled but we deserved it. I am happy but we calm down to train tomorrow and prepare for the match on Saturday.

on bringing his new signings off the bench rather than starting them…
I explained yesterday that the circumstances are different. David Luiz did pre-season with another team and he is okay to play physically but he only trained completely with us yesterday. On Friday he did 30 minutes with us. I was thinking to give them confidence to work together because they were working well together, Sokratis and Chambers. Nicolas Pepe came one week ago and physically he needs to get his best fitness to be ready to play 100 per cent for 90 minutes. I think that today 20 minutes is good for him. And Ceballos is in the middle because he came before Pepe but he got an injury and he stopped training. But he needs to know the Premier League, so today was important for him and for us. I also used Reiss Nelson and Willock because they deserved to be with us and to give them confidence can help us. It’s the same with Martinelli, he played the last 10 minutes because he deserved it.