I really enjoyed the free-flowing end-to-end football from both sides in last night’s draw against PSG, but that is exactly the entertaining sort of game that Arsenal are great at providing.
When we went 1-0 down without threatening the French Champions it looks like we were in for a torrid night, but the boys got their rhythm going and Sanchez earned us a great penalty duly converted by Olivier Giroud.
The second half we were perhaps a bit lucky to get a strange rebound to take the lead but that was equalled out by Iwobi’s slackness to put the ball in his own net. Although we still had some chances in the last quarter of the game it looked to me that PSG had more chances, and yet again Cavani kept missing his chances to punish us. So was a draw a fair result or should we have had all three points? So what did the players and manager think?
Kieran Gibbs felt we could have played better. “It’s a disappointment because it was a good opportunity for us to finish top of the group.” Gibbs said. “We still have a chance but when you go 2-1 up, you want to finish it off in the second half and we haven’t managed to do that. To be honest it’s disappointment that we wanted to perform better. When we get the ball, we can be a lot more dangerous than we showed tonight. But we know we’ve got the quality and we’ll keep going.”
…..”I think, judging by our performance, a draw was probably what we deserved in the end. They’re a good side and they showed that tonight. We can be better and it’s all about working hard to be better. We’ve got the quality.”
Carl Jenkinson was asked if he thought it was a blow to only draw. “Yeah it does. I feel like, for the majority of the game, we were the better team and we could have won it. But it wasn’t meant to be. It’s frustrating because I think it’s a game we could have won.”
But he admitted that it could have gone the other way as well. “I think so. You see Cavani’s chance at the end with his head… they could have nicked it as well. But I think we were the stronger team so it’s a bit disappointing when you haven’t won.
“…It’s frustrating we didn’t win – it feels a bit like a defeat. Everyone’s a bit flat but in the grand scheme of things it’s not a terrible result. We just have to go to Basel and get a good result.”
Arsene Wenger was a bit more objective, saying that both sides had their moments. “Well, I think we have put the intensity into the game and overall I believe that we were committed, for periods dominant. But the start of the game was in favour of Paris Saint-Germain because I think we let them play too comfortably.
“After, the last 20 minutes of the first half we pushed up and came back to 1-1. We had a very strong start again in the second half, where we were dominant until it was 2-1 and after we dropped off and didn’t maintain the pressure and we paid for that. It’s frustrating because we scored an own goal basically on a ball where we thought it was a goal kick. We were a bit passive on the corner, but it’s a 2-2. It’s of course disappointing because we were 2-1 up, but we played against a good team that has top technical quality and that’s it.”
So we haven’t finished top of the Group, but we certainly had a go and gave as good as we got. But PSG also played adventurously and over-ran us at times. So what is your take on it? Are you happy with the draw or do you think we should have won it?
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