Arsenal's Emi Martinez: 'I never accepted that I am a back-up keeper - you work to be the No 1'
Sixteen years old, and a long way from home, Emiliano Martinez never intended to stay at Arsenal. “I was scared,” he says. “I said to my agent: ‘I am only going to trial and see what happens.’ In my mind, there was no way I was going to leave my family.”
After the trial, Martinez returned to his home city of Mar del Plata, on the Atlantic coast of Argentina, and prepared to continue life as normal. He expected to sign a new contract with Independiente, deciding that European football could wait.
But that all changed within a week, when the goalkeeper’s family received a call they did not expect. Arsenal wanted him to come back, to join them on a permanent basis. It was an offer that brought a pressure and a burden to this talented teenager, who was young enough to fear crossing the world on his own but mature enough to know what it meant for his family.
“I saw my brother and mother crying, saying ‘please don’t go,’” he says. “But I had also seen my dad crying late at night because he could not pay the bills. I remember the day that me and my brother ate, but not my mum and dad. I had to be brave. I said yes for them.”
Looking back a decade later, Martinez has no regrets. Arsenal’s longest-serving player has been forced to wait for his chance but, now his moment has come, he has seized it with a characteristically strong grip. Ever since Bernd Leno twisted his knee in June, Martinez has been faultless in goal, playing with such composure and quality that it is hard to see how Leno can ever win his place back.
Saturday’s FA Cup final against Chelsea will mark the high-point of Martinez’s bizarre Arsenal career. Before this season there had been six loan spells, most recently at Reading, and only six Premier League appearances. Throughout it all, his faith in his own ability remained unbroken, even if there were plenty of occasions when he thought he would never be given the opportunity he craved.
“I am not going to lie,” he says. “When I signed for Reading I said ‘this is my last loan’. I had a newborn baby and I was tired of going on loan every time and not having chances in my club. When I finished the season at Reading, I had offers to leave. But I always put Arsenal first. They trusted me.”
Last summer Unai Emery told Martinez that he was good enough to fight Leno for the number one spot, promising that he would play in the cup competitions at least. “It would have been different if they said I was not going to have any game-time,” says Martinez. “Then I would have had to go away, and I would have had to go permanently.”
Having waited 10 years for a run of games like this, Martinez has no intention of surrendering the number one shirt next season. “I don’t think anyone wants to be a second goalkeeper. Especially if you believe so much in yourself. I never accepted that I am a backup keeper. People would say ‘oh, you are the backup’ and it hurts. You work to be the number one.”
Martinez was primed for action from the moment Leno crumpled to the turf against Brighton a few days after football’s restart. His lockdown training had been so intensive, he says, that he felt fitter after the break than before.
“My wife was saying to me: ‘why are you training so much?’ It was because I thought I might have my chance. I have got a full size goal in my garden. I had weights, a mini-gym outside. I was doing proper goalkeeper training. I have something called a ball-launcher, and someone has to feed the balls into it. My wife used to throw the balls but she was terrible at it, and I was playing with my two-year-old boy as well.
“When Bernd got injured, straight after that I had to make a lot of saves. I made it look easy because I was confident I had done the right thing to prepare. I don’t do it week-in, week-out. I do it day by day.”
As well as the flying saves — a late stop against Liverpool was one of the best of the season — Martinez has thrived with the ball at his feet. Bravery in possession is a non-negotiable under Mikel Arteta and Martinez played a starring role in Arsenal’s thrilling team goal against Manchester City in the semi-final, completing a series of high-risk passes within his own six-yard box.
“That is something I have always had,” he says. “When I was young, I used to play up front so I always had the ability to play with the ball, even though I am 6ft 4in. I can use both feet as well. I remember being left-footed when I was very young and then I got an injury on my left ankle so I started kicking with my right foot.
“Mikel hates long balls. I have known him since he was an Arsenal player. We shared dinners together, I went to his house. I remember when he was a player he would talk a lot with the boss [Arsene Wenger], asking about tactics. I always knew Mikel would be a top manager but we never knew how good he was going to be. It is incredible.”
Martinez’s importance to Arsenal extends far beyond the pitch. Behind the scenes he is an influential figure in the dressing room, serving as a mentor and a confidant for the likes of Lucas Torreira and Gabriel Martinelli, his fellow South Americans. This is partly because of his warmth as a person, but also because he knows how much of a culture shock it can be.
When Martinez first arrived at Arsenal, unable to speak the language and struggling to settle, no one stepped forward to help him. “That is why, when Gabi came along, I made sure somebody helped him. I know how much you suffer in the first year. It was very difficult for me because I was underage so in the first year I could not play professionally. I did not have my European passport yet. So from 17 to 18, I did not play in an official game.”
These were testing times, but Martinez never lost his drive. “I said to my mum when I turned 18 and moved into my first flat in Enfield: ‘I don’t want to come back to my country with nothing.’ I did not want to be one of those frustrated players who go to Europe and come back with nothing.”
If all goes to plan, he will have an FA Cup medal around his neck when he next returns to Argentina. Arsenal’s hopes of playing in next season’s Europa League rest on winning this game, and Martinez believes his side, as a collective, will “want it more” than Chelsea.
On a personal level, there is nothing Martinez has wanted more than this opportunity. “Hard work pays off and now is the time,” he says. “Now is my time.”
