Mikel Arteta lamented Arsenal’s profligacy in front of goal after Arsenal dropped points for only the second time this season with a 1-1 draw against Southampton.
The Gunners raced out of the traps at Saint Mary’s and deservedly took the lead in the 11th minute when Ben White set up Granit Xhaka to crash home on the half-volley; the Swiss midfielder’s fourth goal of the season.
The game should have been put to bed as Arsenal continued to dominate but Gabriel Jesus missed three opportunities to double the advantage on an afternoon when the referee Robert Jones seemed blind to repeated fouls on the Brazilian.
The Saints grew in stature after the break and found an equaliser on 65 minutes when Stuart Armstrong calmly beat Aaron Ramsdale after the Gunners’ defence was sliced open.
Both sides flirted with a winner but as legs tired and the skies darkened, neither could muster the quality to take all three points.
Facing the Sky Sports cameras, Arteta was asked if he was frustrated by the result.
“Yes, I am, especially with the chances that we created, the way we started and played the first half, the game should have been in a different position.
“Credit as well to Southampton, the way they came out in the second half, we weren’t as clean and consistent on the ball as we were in the first half. We started to concede a lot of long throws, set plays, [things that] disrupt our game.
“Despite that, I think we created the two biggest chances again in the second half but it wasn’t enough to win the game, unfortunately.
He added: “We didn’t put the ball in the net. We had the big chances and the big situations to put them away and we didn’t. In the Premier League, one is never enough.
“They had a shot and a goal but you still had in the second half that feeling they were putting us under pressure, we gave too many balls away, especially inside; unforced errors that never gave us the continuity we needed to win the game.”
Arsenal remain top of the table and will close out this hectic October schedule with a trip to PSV on Thursday before taking on Nottingham Forest at the Emirates in a week’s time.
Our best start ever over 11 games. Great start.
How VAR didn’t send the ref to the monitor for the Jesus foul I’ll never know!
How? Incompetence, corruption. Probably a bit of both.
Didn’t get involved all game. I assumed after the blatant foul on Jesus along with White and KT being shoved over that communications had broken down again.
A bit off the pace with a dodgy ref…
We were absolutely sh*t second half. No other way of putting it to be honest. The subs that came on should be ashamed. Thomas Partey was drunk the 2nd half. Smh
Really don’t know what ehat was wrong with Partey today. Lost the ball too many times when we were transitioning to attack in the final 20 mins.
Ref didn’t do us any favours either, the number of times he just blatantly ignored Jesus being grabbed and hurled to the ground. I saw it happen at least 6 times, not one foul given.
I thought I was watching wrestling matches at Olympic?! Guest that is what called home field advantage?
I did notice at the start of the game Jim Proudfoot mentioned that Southampton has never lost with this ref on one of their games (in fact, it may have been that they’d won every time).
I don’t want to immediately throw out the idea of bias or corruption; it might be as simple as they know how he calls a game–he’s going to let you get away with all the Greco-Roman stuff in the world–and they adjust their game to really take advantage of that. It’s pretty unfortunate, not to mention grim to watch.
I agree with MA that we didn’t put away the chances we created. But I beg to differ on the point that So’ton came out in the 2nd half against us. I thought it was more about what we didn’t do than what they did. We stopped playing and became sloppy just like we did at Leeds. Moreover, the substitutions, except for Tierney, further undermined us. We lost both control in the final 3rd and incisiveness in the LW when Vieira and Nketiah came in.
We did seem to be struggling to find the same spaces in the middle of the park though – that’s when I started to realise Southampton had improved. There was a formation change made after we scored, and it made a difference.
Nine wins from eleven is outstanding.
My concern is Jesus who simply does not score enough.
Another toiletries is a must
Top striker not toiletries is a must!
Sometimes auto correct is really baffling.
it is !
Head and Shoulders maybe as an plan B.
We thinking shower gel or shaving cream?
Nah boss. We simply didn’t play that well and thought we’d get away with it. It happens. Let’s fix mistakes in the next game.
The next three Ok games then it is the World Cup break.
PL not Ok…
Keep saying it, but would love a striker purchase. I don’t think the plan was Vlahovic or Jesus, and in the end failure to make the CL probably meant a pragmatic solution with Eddie was found. We’re in a strong position now to add some serious firepower, hope we can do it.