Rice to return Saka: “He’s the man!” | Interview | News

After seeing Bukayo Saka mark his return to action with what turned out to be the winner against Fulham, Declan Rice is delighted to put him back at the end of the season.

Only six and a half minutes after being presented on the bench for his first action since before Christmas, Bukayo put himself on the match sheet to make an encouragement of the crowd even stronger than that which followed after his number seven appeared on the table of the fourth official to report his introduction from the bench.

And after having seen closely how much efforts that the winger made to format after his surgery to the hamstrings, his teammate from England Declan is delighted for him personally and professionally while the big games continue to come.

“You could see him get out of the field, how happy he was,” said Declan. “I think that the fans’ reaction talks about itself and how much he liked here. He’s the man isn’t it? This is the one we all expected to come back in shape. We recovered it at a crucial moment, so let’s see what’s going on.

“He worked so hard – really, really hard. I saw him every day. It was a great reset for him, even if he didn’t want to injure himself. He is back in shape, he trains, he is ready.”

While Bukayo will do the titles, Mikel Merino rolled the ball with his sixth goal in the Premier League this season, his biggest campaign in his league career.

These figures may seem drugs for some, since Spanish fills as best he can, but Declan thinks that his capacities mean that he had no doubt that our summer signature could operate effectively.

“It is incredible,” he added. “See him closely and in training, his technical quality – and what he has as a player and how he adapts to the team – is incredible.

“It is not easy to be a midfielder that can play eight or six, but being invited to play nine is a completely different ball game, especially with the way the manager wants to play. He got to the team for the team. It is such a good guy and scoring an objective of the appropriate attacker is incredible.

“Most of the teams now come to the Emirates Stadium and have put a five back against us, so it is difficult to decompose. But we stayed in our process and scored a good goal in the first half. Then the Starboy returned and scored his goal in the second half, which was really special!

“Overall, it’s good to come back there and win the match. We have moved away from each other 16 days, so coming back and winning is a real positive. There is big games to come, and it’s an exciting period to be an arsenal player.”