Arsenal coach Mike Arteta may be happy about defeating Crystal Palace and keeping a 100% record in the Premier League, but he is still not entirely satisfied about his sides’ performance.
The Gunners scraped to a 1-0 win over Crystal Palace and have registered six points in two matches, keeping up with the front runners Manchester City and Brighton & Hove Albion. The goal was scored by Martin Odegaard via a penalty in the 53rd minute.
Arteta explains why he thinks they are not at the level he wants them: “no, because we have to put the ball in the net more often, especially with the dominance we are having in games. But that’s the most difficult thing in football, so if you don’t do that, you have to do the other part, which is be extremely solid. We were last week and we were again today with the chances we conceded. Let’s keep playing better and evolving,” he explained.
“But I loved it, absolutely loved it. It’s a really difficult place to come. We played how we wanted to play 11 against 11, we dominated the game, we created enough chances, we missed two very, very huge chances that normally we put away, but we never gave up. We continued the way we wanted to continue. Eddie (Nketiah) earned us the right to go ahead with his action, we scored the penalty and then we had to play half an hour with 10 men, which is obviously a conflict that we didn’t prepare.
“We had to adapt and I think the players worked fantastically because I don’t think we gave anything away. The subs were great, the way they came out, the concentration, the focus on how they helped the team and changed the team’s momentum in many occasions of the game, so I’m really happy,” he added.
Arteta now has the option of big powerful players and this is a plus for his in their quest to dethrone City as league champions: “When you develop a squad that’s something that a squad has to have to be successful, win and be consistently the very best. That’s something we are trying to do, that means a different profile is needed and when we have to be very physical, we are capable of doing that.” – www.arsenal.com
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