And after their win at Wolves, Arteta agreed: It's not about us, Pep or myself, it's about the well-being of the players.
When you compete in European competition every team has to compete in the same way.
You cannot have a team that hasn't played for seven days, or three days before and has more recovery time, and then you have to play in the Premier League and the FA Cup. It is not right.
If you look in any angle it's not right. If you want to protect, let's talk about the players and the protagonists.
Let's protect the players and do everything we can to give them the maximum time to help them recover and perform and do the show that they do every week."
He added: The boys were unbelievable, the staff was unbelievable. It's a joy to work with them.
We realised that if you want to be in the big competitions fighting for the Champions League, fighting for the Premier League and the level that requires you have to do something special.
You have to be something special and love to compete and expose yourself when it's needed to get the outcome that you want. I thought the boys did that really well today."