Santi Cazorla’s ‘morale high’ after Arsenal’s recent trophy successes

Santi Cazorla has declared that his morale is high after Arsenal’s recent Community Shield and FA Cup triumphs.

The Spain international was a bright spark as the Gunners lumbered to a 2-1 victory over Crystal Palace at The Emirates on Saturday evening.

Kicking off a new season in that fashion is always nice: winning a title and also helping by scoring a goal. That keeps your morale high

Santi Cazorla

Cazorla was forced to contend with speculation surrounding his future this summer following the arrival of Alexis Sanchez and reports of interest from La Liga.

But the former Malaga man, 29, is delighted with the north London side’s recent trophy success and is hoping to help fire the Gunners to more silverware.

“Wembley is a special stadium for me, it will always be for what I’ve achieved there with Arsenal: winning the FA Cup and the Community Shield,” Cazorla told Arsenal’s website.

“Kicking off a new season in that fashion is always nice: winning a title and also helping by scoring a goal. That keeps your morale high. As I always say, my target is helping the team with goals.

“I hope to equal or beat my goal-scoring tally from last season. That’s something every player wants to achieve. Hopefully I’ll help the team with many goals because that would be a signal that I can be useful.

“Apart from that, I’d like to play as much as possible. Luckily the manager has always trusted me in the previous two years; I played a good number of games and hopefully I’ll keep doing so.”