Steve Round slams 'rubbish' rumours as former Arsenal assistant opens up on exit

Steve Round insists he did not leave Arsenal over a bust-up with Mikel Arteta due to the signing of David Raya.

Round departed Arsenal in the summer of 2023 after working as one of Arteta’s assistants since he was hired in December 2019.

It has since been reported that the signing of Raya, who replaced Aaron Ramsdale as Arsenal’s No1, was a factor in Round’s departure.

But Round told Footy Accumulators’ No Tippy Tappy Football podcast: “I read a piece about that and that’s completely untrue, it’s a load of rubbish.

“There were no arguments or differences of opinion or anything like that. When I first went in with Mikel, I said to him, when the time is right, I think I’ll need to move on when it suits us both.

“We had a discussion in that summer [2023] and we said, I think it’s time that I went and we were both in agreement with each other.

“I think I needed to step away from it and have a break. I’ve been on the front line for nearly 30 years and it was tough.

“And I think he [Arteta] needed to refresh his staff as well and promote a couple of younger coaches. I’d moved more into the technical director sphere, which is what I’m looking at right now. So I just felt it was the right time.

“I was proud of what we did there, of what we achieved, to go in and help turn a club around that was starting to fail. I helped to rebuild and embrace the culture that was Arsenal and put it back on track.

“I was gutted we didn’t win the league that year that I left because we were really close. We had a couple of injuries right at the end which stopped us, and we were coming up against what is arguably the best team I’ve ever seen in the Premier League, and I’ve seen a lot since the early 90s.

“You look at the team now, there’s men all the way through the team who are physical, strong, aggressive, superb on set pieces. They can score a wide range of goals, and I think they’ll push right to the end this year.

“I know there’s a nine-point gap now, but that can easily whittle away. If Liverpool lose [Mohamed] Salah or [Virgil] Van Dijk, the whole thing can change really quickly. It will go right down to the wire this season.”