There is no denying the fact that Arsenal played embarrassingly badly last night, and our recent form and Emery’s team selections have left most of us scratching our heads, but surely just a 1-0 away defeat in any European competition is such a big hurdle to overcome?
Despite Emery leaving Ramsey and Ozil out yet again we put out a very strong side but despite a massive 77% possession we failed to produce even one goal from our only 3 shots on target, despite 16 attempts.
We are definitely much stronger and more confident at the Emirates and the fact is that we only need to win 1-0 to take the game to extra time, or win by two clear goals to make sure we are into the next round. Unai Emery seems quite confident we will still go through… “I trust in our players and I trust in our stadium and supporters,” he said on Arsenal.com. “There are two matches. Tonight’s match is important but we can’t [be knocked out in it], we are going to play a second match next week.
“I trust in our work to prepare for the next match and to have a different result at Emirates Stadium.
“I respect [BATE] and I know about them because we watched matches they played. An organised team, defensively a good team and good at transitions. We worked to stop them in these actions but they scored one goal and in the transitions we worked well to stop another situation defensively for us.
“Then in the attacking moment we had the chances, more than them, but the goalkeeper and the last action for us was not efficient. But we did our all to win the match.
“It’s the first 90 minutes. I know it’s more difficult here as we [didn’t] take a better result, but the next match at the Emirates we are going to continue our work today and I want to work to take better attacking moments with more efficiency and to win the match.”
I must say I honestly do believe that we will come back and get through at home, but if we don’t start playing with more confidence away from home we are not going to get much further.
What do you think?
Sam P