“It started at Anfield.”
Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta (41) cited the draw against Liverpool last month as the decisive moment away from the championship trophy.
Arsenal lost 0-1 to Nottingham Forest in the 37th round of the 2022-2023 Premier League (PL) held at The City Ground in Nottingham, England on the 21st (Korean time).
In the end, Arsenal (81 points) failed to win the league regardless of the final match result. Thanks to Arsenal’s slip, leading Manchester City (85 points) confirmed their third consecutive PL title with a fisherman’s stance.
It is an all-time runner-up. According to ‘Opta’, a football statistics media, Arsenal gave up the championship trophy even after occupying the top of the leaderboard for 248 days this season. With this, Arsenal wrote a sad record as a team that did not win the title after leading the league for the longest time in PL history.
Arsenal was ranked as the number one candidate for the championship until about a month ago. They have won five straight since opening, and have lost only one game in their first 19 games. However, in February, he lost in a head-to-head match with Man City and allowed pursuit, and eventually failed to challenge for the title by exposing his lack of back heart. In the last 8 matches, they have 2 wins, 3 draws and 3 losses.
Director Arteta could not hide his mixed feelings. After the loss, he said, “It’s a really sad day. There are a lot of hard feelings. We lost the game, we lost the championship after fighting for 10 and a half months. I have created the illusion, the passion and the belief that we can go all the way and win. I know, but we fell short.”
Arteta continued: “Congratulations to Manchester City. They are champions and they deserve it. They did it in 38 games, we didn’t. That’s it. We created the belief that we could do it, but we apologize for not being able to do it. “It’s my responsibility,” he said.
The ending is disappointing, but second place is also an undeniable achievement. Nevertheless, Arteta said, “But today is painful. We are here to win. I am here to win, and I want to win. Everyone deserves to win, but we didn’t win. It’s painful. I’m here to win. We live high, but now it’s the next step. We have to win, and we felt inadequate.”
Arteta looked back on how things started to go wrong with the draw against Liverpool last month. At that time, Arsenal took a 2-0 lead in the 28th minute of the first half, but they conceded a goal each at the end of the first half and the last minute of the second half, and ended up drawing 2-2. The performance in the second half was particularly disappointing.
When asked when he started to fall behind in the title race, Arteta said: “It started with the game at Anfield. We missed a good chance and then against West Ham we could have won 3-1, but we drew. We conceded too many goals.” replied.먹튀검증
“You have to excel in everything to win the title. Manchester City didn’t give us room, but we left too much room. That’s how we lost in the league,” he said bitterly.