'It was an unbelievable day... they sang for me!'

Pablo Mari will never forget his first appearance at Emirates Stadium.

Fresh after making his debut in our Emirates FA Cup fifth-round win over Portsmouth, the 26-year-old starred in defence as we kept a clean sheet against West Ham United on Saturday.

 

And it's an experience which has only left the Spanish defender hungry for more.

 

"For me, it was an unbelievable day," Mari said. "It was a nice night for everybody and we won the game, which is the most important thing. Also my feeling on the pitch was really nice.

 

"With our fans, with our team, in our home, I think I had everything there to enjoy it. I enjoyed that game a lot and I hope I'm going to play the next games to feel the same with our team-mates and also for the club.

 

"The fans did a little bit of a song for me when I was named in the starting XI, and I'm so happy about that. This means they are feeling happy with me, with my job, so this is nice. I'm going to try to do my best in all the games, to win games, to get points. This is the most important thing, to win games, because we want to move up the table."

 

Both appearances have come alongside David Luiz at the heart of defence and after keeping back-to-back clean sheets, Mari is hoping the duo can continue to develop their blossoming partnership in the coming weeks.

 

"We know that David is an unbelievable player," he said. "He's had a good career and is a good football player, and also playing with him is so easy. These two games with him in the starting XI were nice because I only focused on my job and I didn't need to focus on other jobs.

 

"This is easy when you want to have a big game. We know he's an experienced player and sometimes when you need to do different things in the last minutes, like when you need to make calls or something like this, he can do it. For us, it's easy to play with him."