Rob Holding admitted that Mikel Arteta shouted at the Arsenal team at half-time during the West Ham clash, but was the team already on course for victory?
The Gunners allowed the Hammers very little opportunities in the first-half, with them eventually levelling the tie from a half-chance when
Jarrod Bowen somehow snuck his effort beyond Gabriel Magalhaes and Aaron Ramsdale.
The timing definitely came as a blow, just six minutes after we had taken the lead through Rob Holding’s header, and it assured that the two sides went into the break level.
The defender has now admitted that he and his team-mates were shouted at during the break when speaking to Arsenal Media.
“Yeah, we were a bit disappointed to concede that coming in just before half time,” Holding said.
“It would have been nice to go in one-nil, but he gave us all a shouting and telling off and we came out and looked more like a team and played how he wanted to play.”
While we weren’t leading at the break, we were pretty solid in the opening half in limiting our rivals to very little, and I couldn’t help but feel that we would get our chances as the game went on.
The boss obviously couldn’t contain himself after seeing his side concede late in the initial 45 minutes, and moved to reprimand his players in the dressing room, and the team did seem to improve after the break. The goal definitely will have helped to settle our nerves and allow us to take control, moving to play more on the counter after we had that lead.
Do you believe the ‘telling off’ made all the difference at the break or do you feel like the game was always going to end up the same way?
Patrick
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How come the telling off only worked once against wolves but have failed in all other occasion when we are behind..??
Maybe he used to talk to them like an adults, but this time around he use his authority.
So in ur mind telling of automatically means winning
We tried to take the game to them by starting on the front foot, but we lack fluidity and it became a scrappy affair.
My biggest disappointment is conceding just before the break, there is an urgent need to learn on managing games even for a short period.
Lacked any real quality and every player guilty of giving the ball away. We are winning, getting the points and while we are, great. As with the 3 defeats previous, the problems come when we play poor and get ziltch. I dont like the way we play but 3 points matters more at the moment. Our shape at times is brilliant but also at times really exposed, the balance between defence and attack is not right. Again winning at the moment papers over that and thats all that counts but 3 defeats and 3 wins proves there is a lot of improvement needed.
Agree with gun smoke. The gunners must find ways
to protect the lead. Against Spurs who have quality attackers,it could be fatal
Some teams concede possession and hit on the counter. We have seen this style fail many times against the top sides.
I say let them pass to eternity and pounce on the odd error and score to win,
You are right Reegie. We were sloppy but 3 points matter most.
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I just don’t like that olympic stadium,a very terrible football pitch dimension-wise.
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Whether it was Arteta’s half time team talk or the individual motivation of the players that we managed to win, we will never know. Point is we won and the 3 points are very crucial. My only worry is Tavares, he just cant seem to defend and hope MA plays Cedric as LB. Each of the next 4 remaining games are like Cup finals and we got to win all of them, come what may. I also liked Nketiah’s work rate and if only he improves on his finishing in the remaining 4 games, top 4 is ours.