Mikel Arteta names his 2 vice-captains to Martin Odegaard | OneFootball

Granit Xhaka and Gabriel Jesus will act as Arsenal’s vice-captains this season, supporting Martin Odegaard in the main role.

David Ornstein reports for The Athletic that Mikel Arteta has nominated two players to support Martin Odegaard in his role as club captain: Granit Xhaka and Gabriel Jesus.

Those three will form the core of Arsenal’s leadership group, and Xhaka and Jesus will wear the armband when Odegaard can’t. For example, Xhaka took on the armband for the final minutes on Saturday.

Arteta is hoping to share leadership responsibility throughout the group, not just between Odegaard, Xhaka, and Jesus, but also with the club’s other senior players.

Obviously, there is history with Xhaka and the captain’s armband, after he was previously awarded the main role before losing it in a confrontation with the fans at the Emirates Stadium.

Yet he’s turned things around and remains one of the leaders within the squad. That’s one of the things Amazon’s All or Nothing documentary has made clear, with Xhaka clearly one of the vocal players in the dressing room.

It’s probably unlikely Xhaka ever reclaims the permanent captaincy role. For a start, Odegaard will probably outlast him at Arsenal, given their respective ages and contract situations.

Even if Odegaard did make a shock early exit, you’d imagine Jesus would take over the armband, if only to avoid the unnecessary scrutiny on Xhaka.

But that won’t change the fact that Xhaka is a key figure at Arsenal and is clearly highly rated by Arteta.