'He was adamant': Mikel Arteta opens up on Nico Pepe's loan move to Lyon

"It's been three years since he [Nicolas Pepe] joined," explained Mikel Arteta in his press conference.

"He's had some very good moments, some moments when he hasn't contributed much in terms of minutes.

"We have decided to let him go. He needs minutes, he needs to play football, he was very adamant to do that."

Pepe joined Arsenal for a whopping £72 million but has failed to live up to his price tag since then.

The 27-year-old winger could only score 16 times in the Premier League over three seasons, falling out of favour under Arteta.

Source: Charles Watts @ Twitter