Aston Villa goalkeeper Emiliano Martinez admits he lost his love for football with his spell of inactivity at Arsenal.

The Argentina star, who recently won Copa America with his country, spent the best part of a decade in north London without featuring for the first-team.

Martinez has become one of the best shot-stoppers in the Premier League at Villa Park, but admits he almost gave up football during his tough days at the Gunners.

"I don't think you prepare for not playing, I always thought I had the talent but at some stage in my career when I was 22, 23 and I wasn't playing, I went on my first loan to Spain, I played only six games," he recalled to Football Daily.

"Then I knew I would have to go back to Arsenal and they wouldn't give me a chance, so I would have to go on loan, so those years were really difficult, at some point I stopped loving football.

"That was something I was worried about, I told my wife, 'I know I'm not playing but I've stopped watching football games,' so it wasn't an easy place to be. Then I went on loan again to Reading in the Championship, a league which I didn't want to be in,

"I put myself in a position: I have a newborn baby, this is going to be my last loan. I got that in my head, I started with a psychologist that helped me through my bad moment, it helped me to get past my frustrations.

"Because I always believed I had the talent, I always believed in myself, that I could be one of the best."