Arsenal Women’s manager Joe Montemurro has talked about creating a legacy at former club Melbourne City, and how he’s going to be successful with his new team.

Arsenal brought in Montemurro in November, to replace the departing Pedro Losa. The Gunners were having a poor start to the season, and needed someone with experience to come in and turn things round.

Montemurro seems to be the man for the job, with a 16-year coaching career behind him, as well as a lot of recent success with Melbourne City who won back-to-back titles under his management, and achieved an unbeaten season as well.

“You are always proud of these moments and successes in football, but I think from a club perspective it was very important,” Montemurro said. “There are moments in football that you hope you can keep having and keep challenging yourself and I think it was a great period in the club’s history.

“It was a great opportunity, because we got to build the club from scratch from day one and it was a good project because we were able to stamp the identity and the way we wanted to do things, the high standards and pretty much everything from day one.

“That was fantastic because you effectively created the template for success in the years to come, so it was a very good project and an exciting project for me as a starter – it’s good that I’ve left a legacy or a template where they can have continued success.”

As for how he plans to coach the Arsenal Women, Montemurro seems to have a similar focus to Arsène Wenger, in that he wants the team to get things right in possession.

“[My footballing philosophy is that] we play with the ball, we try to solve problems with the ball,” he explained. “It’s good to have good balance without the ball, but it’s a very proactive game, probably things you’ve all heard before.

“The ability to transfer that style of play into the way you train, the ethos of the team and the integrity of the team. I’m very passionate about what I do, so there’s definitely a high energy in the group.

“I think the thing in management is to be very humble and probably the most important thing is to care about your players and really get to know how they work and understand how they work in the group dynamic.”

Hopefully he can show what he can bring to the team over the coming months. Arsenal currently sit in third place in the WSL 1 table, and face fourth-placed Liverpool at the weekend, so there’s no time to waste.

It’s been five years since they last won the league title, having previously dominated Women’s football for around a decade. But now Manchester City and Chelsea are the sides to beat.