Gary Neville believes Mikel Arteta became too desperate when his Arsenal side was 2-1 down against Manchester United and made the wrong changes.
They struggled to break United down for much of the game and the Red Devils caused them several problems on the break.
When United went 2-1 up, Arteta switched things around and introduced Emile Smith Rowe, Fabio Vieira and Eddie Nketiah into the game in place of Martin Odegaard, Albert Sambi Lokonga and Oleksandr Zinchenko.
These changes altered how Arsenal played, but it did not give the desired result and the Gunners conceded another goal.
Neville believes United’s second goal rattled Arsenal and Arteta’s changes in response spoilt their game plan.
He said, as quoted by The Daily Mail:
‘What shocked Arsenal, was that second goal going in. It came against the run of play and Arsenal did not handle that point in the game well. They deserved to lose the game, because they never handled that second goal going in.
‘Arsenal, if they kept on playing the way they were, they’d have got back into the game.
‘As soon as they lost their shape with all those substitutions, United were always going to score that third on the counter-attack.’
Just Arsenal Opinion
We needed to respond to the goal and Arteta made the choice he felt was best for the team.
It was not right in that instance, but that doesn’t mean he made the wrong choices because, in other matches, it could have made things better for them.
Arteta: ‘Arsenal need to play with more courage’
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