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Football London
Football London
Sport
Josh Challies

Arsenal legend identifies Unai Emery's one big problem behind disappointing Everton loss

Arsenal have a lack of leadership on the field and Unai Emery needs help to solve problems on the field.

That’s the view of former Gunners midfielder Ray Parlour, who believes Arsenal need to identify someone who can become a modern day version of club legend Tony Adams.

Emery has rotated the captaincy this season following the retirement of Per Mertesacker, with Mesut Ozil, Petr Cech, Laurent Koscielny and Aaron Ramsey among those to have worn the armband this season.

Ozil was the skipper for the trip to face Goodison Park on Sunday, where the Gunners saw their top-four ambitions suffer a blow following a 1-0 defeat to Everton - and could slip to fifth in the standings this evening as a result.

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The former Germany international has been criticised in the wake of defeat after being unable to maintain a decent record of form recently but Parlour believes it is just an indication of a deeper problem at the club.

"Football has moved on from my era, the likes of Tony Adams, the last real proper leader was probably John Terry at Chelsea,” he told TalkSport.

Mesut Ozil was unable to continue his run of form against Everton. ((Photo by Jan Kruger/Getty Images))

"It's a bit of a surprise, Ozil being captain, I'm looking at who else could be captain. That's what they're missing.

"In an ideal world, you'll always want centre halves to be skipper. You've got to have the right personnel to be given the armband but you're looking at the whole of the pitch.

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"We used to have people like Tony Adams and Tony, if you weren't doing your job, he'd be going crazy at you. That's what you need, it's not rocket science.

“I don't see that enough these days, it can't always be the manager who sorts this out."

Arsenal will look to return to winning ways on Thursday for the first-leg of their Europa League quarter-final clash with Napoli, before facing another tough test on the road next Monday against FA Cup finalists Watford.

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