Nacho Monreal has revealed that Arsene Wenger got angry at half-time of Sunday’s 1-1 draw with Manchester United as he looked to inject urgency and energy into his lacklustre side.
The Gunners didn’t muster a shot on target in the opening 45 minutes and deservedly trailed at the break to Ander Herrera’s volley. However, they rallied in the final thirty minutes to snatch an equaliser courtesy of Tyler Blackett’s own goal before pushing for an unlikely winner.
Reflecting on a hard fought point, Monreal told Arsenal.com that he felt the first half was arguably Arsenal’s worst of the entire season:
“We know that we didn’t play very well in the first half, it was probably the worst 45 minutes we have played this season.
“The boss was angry, which is normal and we knew that we have another 45 minutes to fix it. In the second half we played much better than the first, we were lucky because we could score and draw the game. And we go home happy with the score.
“We didn’t play well in the first half and the boss was a bit angry with our performance, but we knew we could make a difference. We played much better and drew the game, and almost won it as we had some chances. But the draw is good for us.”
Aaron Ramsey, trying to put his finger on why he and his teammates initially struggled to get into the game, added:
“The fact that we lost against Swansea, maybe that was in the back of our minds. It took us some time to get going but when we did find our rhythm we felt quite comfortable out there.
“We were a bit nervy and rushed our game a bit. It was important to come out in the second half and put our stamp on the game and I feel like we did that in the end.”
With two matches to secure the single point needed to nail down third place the Welshman underlined that the Gunners can feel confident of topping United. He also touched on the importance of consistency and momentum ahead of the FA Cup final on 30 May.
“It is another important game [against Sunderland on Wednesday]. They will be fighting for their lives and we have two home games and we want to finish strong before the FA Cup final.
“I think we feel quite confident about [finishing in third]. It was important to get a result today and hopefully we can go into the remaining games and win them both before the big one.”
Nice to hear that Arsene has a hairdryer, though I suspect it is quite a small one.
A travel hairdryer maybe.
A travel one that you can use in the car in case the handbrake is a little bit on?
Wasn’t disappointed with the result – performance is another matter. Hope we can lift it for the cup.
On another note, Blogs, congratulations on that little Gatorade feature I saw on the Arsenal Facebook page – couldn’t help but recognise that sexy voice (no homo). Probably what Zeus sounds like. If he were Irish.
thumb down for the use of “no homo”.
Arsenal fans should be better than that
Arsenal fans should be Arsenal fans.
Nowhere do I inply that “homo” was a bad thing, merely that I’m not homosexual, which surely must be okay.
Apologies if misinterpreted, but I’m fully against discrimination as well x
Think it was more the fact you were worried about being perceived as a homosexual to such an extent that you had to caveat your comment. Which implicitly suggests a degree of homophobia on your part. Hence the collective disapproval
Whilst that half was poor the St Mary’s display was abject. A win on Wed, rest some this weekend and hopefully Villa will capitulate like Saturday. Cup winners again.
And people say AW’s lost his fire..
is it true wenger found fergies hair drier at half time in an old locker in the changing room ha ha it worked for performance wise but apart from a little bit of luck for the goal we didnt look like scoring if we played all week, this is the weakest side man u fielded in years and still we cant beat them with as Wenger thinks is our best side no shot in 45 minutes is disgraceful in any league or any standard, we had no width and always one pass too many we need to work the goalie… Read more »
Weakest side for years? Did you miss the the whole season with Moyes, THAT was the worst United side ever (the fact that we never beat that team is a fucking scandal).
Even though I loathe the red cheating cunts, they do have a couple of quality players at the moment.
That Man Utd squad is the most expensively-assembled squad in the Premier League. Whether it’s their weakest or not is a matter of opinion but I suspect you’d have been begging for Arsenal to sign any one of Blind, Di Maria, Mata or Falcao when they became available.
Is this a report from 2009?
Nacho has been one of the most consistent guys this season.
Wasn’t quite as bad as the first half at stoke, but up there this season, decent second half though
Yea i think dat first half at Brittania was worse
Chelsea is the only other top 4 team we have lost away to in the league this year. We have even beaten city and united(in the cup). Ask any fan and most would have taken that at the start of the season. There are still things we need to improve on and get a couple more players in for next season but we are going in the right direction. Win another cup and I for one will be satisfied with the season especially after the start we made.
If we can avoid playing other half-decent teams with an S away – Spurs, Stoke, Swansea, Southampton – we will have a better chance. Or get a magic spell.
But we lost to Swansea home and away, and at Stoke and to an average Spurs, who took five points off us. We also drew at home to the soon-to-be-relegated Hull. And Chelsea also took five points off us.
That’s why we were never in the title race.
Who was in the title race?
5 points?
Yes, 5 points that we dropped ( but 4 that they gained). We took 1 point from 2 games against each of Chelsea (as we did last year), United (ditto) and Spurs. That’s 15 more points we’d have had if we’d won those matches.
Sunderland only need a point to stay in the PL. It just happens that we only need a point too.
What is the difference monetarily between third and second?
£1.9m I believe.
but the difference between 3rd n 4th isnt much, the extra CL games provide a little extra, no?
I actually don’t know but i suspect not much less. Obviously the CL games would’ve been worth another £1m or so in gate receipts but with the obvious uncertainty about how much CL money we would have plaguing our transfer activity all summer.
Interesting day yesterday, wasn’t it? I thought that the theme of the afternoon was actually goalkeeping. I sat down on Sunday and watched both Sky matches (yes, I’ve got no life). In the Swansea v City game we saw two very contrasting performances between the sticks. Our erstwhile Number One, Flappyhandski, made a few decent saves but was found wanting when it really mattered: he should have saved three of the four City goals. But at the other end Joe Hart was magnificent: that late flying parry, in particular, was unbelievable. Hart has taken his game to another level this… Read more »
Hart had a very good game but then he’s also had some absolute shockers this season, particularly when the pressure has been on this season. Ospina could have done better on the goal but it was hardly a major error, surely you would agree that the bigger issue was Herrera being given the freedom of Manchester? As for the dig at Wenger, it’s easy to be wise in hindsight – most reasonable people would’ve given Szczesny, the keeper of the season last season, a further chance to improve this season and most people would’ve said that signing an international keeper… Read more »
Who cares about last season? What matters is this summer. We must out out and buy a top keeper – any fool can see this – but I bet you that Wenger won’t do it. This is why Le Prof drives me up the wall: his teams are always a couple of players short. You just know that Wenger is going to faff around in the transfer market and leave us without the players we need to take the title.
Ah summer, sun setting late, beers chilling, bbqs heating and the sound of a few melodramatic Gooners flipping out. So you’re being driven up the wall by something that hasn’t happened yet? You need to chill, we’re in May, there’s a long way to go before next season starts. I’d like an upgrade to any position but i’m also not somebody that thinks our current keepers are awful and I certainly don’t want Wenger signing people just for the sake of keeping a few ridiculous fans calm. If there’s an upgrade available then we should always see if we can… Read more »
I remember Valdes as the keeper who prevented us from winning the CL. Yes, Hart and De Gea were very good this year but they were not so good two to three years ago.
Our first team lacks leadership at the moment
Didn’t hear this when we were on 8 games winning run.
Hence the phrase at the moment
You’ve lived up to your namesake, Z.
A friend was at a charity dinner a few years back which had an ex Arsenal player on each table. His table had Bob Wilson on it.Bob said that while Wenger has a brilliant football brain when it comes to Goalkeepers’ he has a ‘blind spot’ and he finds it hard to differentiate between a good Goalkeeper and a mediocre one.
Of course Wilson is also on record as saying that Szczesny is an excellent keeper and he’s said pretty much the same about every other Arsenal keeper in recent seasons, including Stuart Taylor. Bob’s a legend but there’s a reason why he was presenting Grandstand when he retired.
I remembered last season and how embarrassing we were as team against the bigger teams, this season arsene as address that and yet still we moan, we won the cup and we’re gonna win it again it seems and yet still we moan! Wtf is improvement to all you guys? In my eyes the team is improving and going places that for damn sure. Arsenal fans are a fucking disgrace sometimes and that’s the honest truth..
I’d quite like it if the players still talked about fighting for second rather than just securing 3rd. It’s still possible (just!) so would be nice to know they’ve not given up on it…
Media painting it as a third place battle. They were still prattling about us fighting for fourth when we had long secured it. Frankly media are as per usual clueless. They will point to us not having a chance at the title next season because we ‘never spend’ when we have not been shy of bringing big names in recent seasons. And their prescription of adding wholesale change (chopping managers) as per what Liverpool and Spurs have done have been detrimental where the title winners in Chelsea have had the shallowest squad of the top 4 this season plus they… Read more »
HAHA GO VENGER GO! I LIKE IT.
I don’t think arsenal fighting spirit is enough. They should press their opponent at the first minutes, but not press them after conceded.
If what Ramsey said is true – we were jittery in the first half because of Swansea, then that’s definitely somewhere we need to improve. Hate the rent boys, but whenever they lose, they bounce back immediately. We’ve improved at it this year, but it’s just a form of mental conditioning. Given our trajectory thus far over the past 24 months, there’s no reason why we can’t improve. We’re lucky we were just playing Manure minus Rooney. If it had been another team, so a poor first half would have locked us out of the game. Maybe part of the… Read more »