Mikel Arteta has praised Nuno Tavares' reaction since he was subbed off in the first half against Nottingham Forest - and believes the experience will spur the Portuguese defender on.
Our manager knows from personal experience how difficult it is to be taken off early, but says that while it was "not pleasant", it was a move that he took for the good of the team.
"I am there to make the right decisions to get the best performance out of the team," Arteta said. "It is not pleasant to make those decisions, it leaves a bad taste but at the same time we are here to help our players and to help our players you have to do it in many different ways.
"Hopefully that’s a way because certainly, we want to support our players, we want to help them and because you have to make a decision on the day, on my side it gives me more encouragement to help them because I have been there.
"I have been substituted after 45 minutes and I have been upset, but it is part of a process and a development phase in any career and it’s part of the experiences and some experiences, unfortunately, aren’t pleasant but most of those, if you take in the right way, they are the ones that help you to progress and become a better person or player."
So what was Mikel's reaction when it happened to him - and how has Tavares taken it over the past few days?
"[I was] upset and [thought] the coach is wrong, and this is not fair," Arteta said. "This is normally the reaction.
"With Nuno I didn’t get that reaction at all and that’s it. For me it is just a moment, so move on and focus on all the good things as well that he has done since he has been here."
Copyright 2024 The Arsenal Football Club Limited. Permission to use quotations from this article is granted subject to appropriate credit being given to www.arsenal.com as the source.