Mikel Arteta is keeping a close eye on the Premier League's touchline habits — and he has the evidence to prove it.

The Arsenal manager has earned a reputation for wandering beyond his technical area, but Arteta insists he is nowhere near the worst offender in the top flight. After collecting his second yellow card of the season for the offence during Arsenal's win over Everton on Saturday, the Spaniard revealed he has been quietly compiling a dossier of images featuring other managers doing exactly the same thing.

"I do have to be careful. They should put sensors there," Arteta said. "There are managers who have the record in the league, 36 times in 10 minutes they leave the touchline — no yellows."

"I am clipping all of that so I have now a massive storage of images, so if somebody comes to me I can say, 'I am not in the record yet'. Somebody else has the record so let's see. Then it's 36 yellow cards in 10 minutes for the managers. I don't know what we are going to do — let's see."

The mystery manager

Arteta stopped short of naming the manager he believes holds that remarkable record, leaving the identity of the serial touchline wanderer open to speculation. A BBC Sport study conducted in April 2025 found that, among current Premier League managers, Aston Villa's Unai Emery spent the most time outside his technical area — though whether Emery is the figure Arteta had in mind remains unconfirmed.

What Arteta plans to do with his growing archive of touchline footage is equally unclear. Whether it becomes a formal complaint to officials, a negotiating tool, or simply a personal vindication file, the message to fellow managers is plain: Arteta is watching, and he is taking notes.