Unai Emery has confirmed Nacho Monreal joining his current group of first-team captains, and the Arsenal head coach plans to appoint two more in the coming weeks.

At the end of last season, Granit Xhaka, Mesut Özil, Laurent Koscielny, Petr Cech and Aaron Ramsey were the five captains at Arsenal. Koscielny was the number one, with the remainder getting chances to wear the armband when the centre-back was absent.

The summer didn’t bode well for the group though, with Cech retiring, Ramsey leaving and Koscielny going on strike to force an exit of his own.

Unai Emery essentially confirmed that Koscielny was no longer among the group of captains in his press conference on Sunday, as well as revealing that Monreal would join the remaining pair Xhaka and Özil.

“We are working now with the captains,” Emery said. “They are Xhaka, Özil and Nacho Monreal. I want to add two more and then I am going to decide the number one, two, three, four and five in the next weeks.”

Monreal recently admitted he was relishing the opportunity to wear the armband, saying it “makes me happy and makes me feel like I have more responsibility”.

Having joined Arsenal all the way back in 2013 and as one of the older, more experienced players in the group, it makes sense that Monreal would start to move into more of a leadership role in the team.

We should find out the other two very soon, as well as Emery’s decision on the first-choice captain.