LONDON: Alexis Sanchez's ability to adapt to English football has been praised by his manager Arsène Wenger but the Chilean has admitted that he believes the Premier League is more suited to his style of play than La Liga.
The 25-year-old Sanchez joined Arsenal last summer in a 30 million euros move from Barcelona and has since scored 14 goals in 22 games. Though the Chilean won five trophies in his three seasons at the Camp Nou, having joined from Udinese in 2011, Sanchez often found himself out of the team for big games and his relationship with Argentine superstar Lionel Messi in particular came under public scrutiny, reports the Daily Telegraph.
Sanchez has now admitted that he found it difficult to adapt to Barca's way of playing, but says that player-for-player Arsenal are every bit as good as the Catalans.
“It cost me a lot to adapt to playing the Barcelona way. The first year was Ok and then the second year I was better, but I needed time. Arsenal play beautiful football, but Barcelona play in a way that no other team in the world does. English football is more direct, more end to end, but I like that. It suits the way I want to play,” Sanchez said.
“My teammates have helped me adapt. If my teammates were not so good, then I would not have done so well. It is that easy. The quality here is impressive. You only need to take a glance around (a training session) to see that. It is the same level, more or less, as there was at Barcelona. We do different things in training, but player for player, it is just about the same.”