‘NOW THE BEST’: £20m player now nearly the best in the world, just three years after ARTETA pushed HIM out of Arsenal
Agentine international worked with Neil Cutler at Aston Villa, who thinks he is now one of the best goalkeepers in the world.
Cutler told BBC Sport that he always told Martinez he could have whatever career he wanted and he has gone out and grabbed it.
Martinez won the World Cup with Argentina last year, when his penalty shootout exploits were key in both the quarter-final and final.
The Argentine does things in his own way and does not care what he has to do to get inside a penalty taker’s head.
Cutler says Emi Martinez is now close to being the world’s best goalkeeper
Cutler said: “Sometimes my job was just to be the psychologist, and understand him emotionally and what he was thinking.
“He was so eager to keep clean sheets, he wanted to save everything, even the impossible, so he has had to learn how to deal with not achieving certain things.
“But never once did I say ‘come on, Emi, you are never going to be the best in the world’. I’d always say ‘there is no reason why you can’t achieve that’, and now he is getting very, very close.”
Martinez will go up against the man who sold him to Villa for £20 million, Mikel Arteta, tomorrow lunchtime when Villa host Arsenal.
Plenty has been made of the fact that Unai Emery will be keen to get one over on the Gunners, but so will Martinez, whose career has gone from strength to strength at Villa Park.
Arsenal are desperate for a win after a run of four games without one but they will need to get past Martinez who showed at the World Cup exactly what he can do.
