Arsenal loanee Nicolas Pepe has admitted he and Mikel Arteta were in disagreement over what he could've brought to the Gunners. Pepe was signed by Unai Emery during his tenure at Emirates Stadium in 2019 for a club-record £72million from Lille, but three years later he finds himself back in Ligue 1 on loan at Nice after a mostly disappointing stint in north London.
In his first full season in England, Pepe scored eight goals from 42 appearances in all competitions before enjoying his best goal scoring season the following year bagging 16 goals from 47 games. The rapid emergence of Bukayo Saka saw Pepe's game time diminish, however, with the Ivorian making just 20 Premier League appearances in the 2021/22 season, which saw no starts after mid-October.
Towards the end of August 2022, after Arsenal had won their first three league games with Pepe not playing for a single minute, the 27-year-old joined Nice on a season-long loan. Lucien Favre was the man in charge of the French club for Pepe's relatively bright start to life back in France where he scored six goals in 19 games.
