Mohamed elneny has revealed Arsenal players are ‘scared' to step out of line after mikel arteta stripped pierre-emerick aubameyang off the armband last season.
The Gunners are set to face Chelsea on Sunday at Stamford Bridge, which will see Aubameyang face his former club for the first time since his exit in January.
READ: Pushes everybody, Mikel Arteta praises Mohamed Elneny
Former captain Aubameyang was stripped of the armband, dropped, and then had his Arsenal contract terminated following a number of misdemeanours after a fall-out with Mikel Arteta.
Before the derby, A BT Sport promo for the match saw Aubameyang speak up for the derby saying: “Arsenal, nothing personal. I'm back. I'm blue. I'm ready.”
When asked about facing his former teammate, mohamed elneny refused to enter into a war of words as he backed up his manager for the Aubameyang decision.
“Now we just focus on ourselves now,” Elneny replied.
“Aubameyang was one of our players and now he decided to go to a different team. Now we just focus on ourselves, and we look to win the game.”
“We don't allow big egos. This is the dressing room we have now. Everyone loves each other and everyone works for each other.
“This is what actually makes our squad really strong, because we don't have egos in the team.
“Now everyone looked at themselves because Mikel did that to the captain of the team. What is he going to do with another player?
“This showed that now we can't play around, now we have to be calm with the team and the way the team is going we have to stick with the team, not do something different.
“Everyone is scared with their position because this happened to Aubameyang. Of course if anyone is not the captain of the team, does a small mistake, they are going to have the same problem, and no one needs that problem.
“We agree with what Mikel decided because he is our boss and we just have to agree what his vision is for us.”
“I think we work really hard and we believe in each other,” said Elneny on his side's key to success this term.
“We have really good quality players as well and we have young players as well, who are technically really good players.
“The squad now is really strong and everyone is pushing hard, because we know Arsenal is a big club and we need to put Arsenal in the place they actually deserve. This is what we play for.
“Now we just focus on ourselves now. Aubameyang was one of our players and now he decided to go to a different team. Now we just focus on ourselves and we look to win the game [against Chelsea].
“We know what we are going there to do, because now we know we look for the title.”
