Arsenal missed the opportunity to return to the top of the Premier League as West Ham secured a surprise 2-0 win at Emirates Stadium courtesy of goals from Tomas Soucek and Dinos Mavropanos.
The Gunners dominated the game and had more than enough chances to get on the scoresheet, but their profligacy in front of goal proved costly. In fact, David Moyes’ side might have won by an even greater margin only for David Raya to save Said Benrahma’s stoppage-time penalty.
Here’s what the coaches and players made of the game.
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Mikel Arteta on the defeat…
I’m really disappointed with the result. I think the performance, except in both boxes, was extraordinary. We conceded two poor goals against a team that are really efficient when they arrive [in the box]. And then, yeah, with the amount of situations, shots, open chances, and the amount of touches that we had in the opponent’s box, it’s incredible that we haven’t scored a goal.
Source: beIN SPORTS
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David Moyes on his side’s win…
We’ve lost a couple of games conceding five in recent weeks, which I’ve hated. I try not to get my teams to do that, but tonight we’ve defended really well. We had two different centre-halves tonight, we lost Paquetá [during the first half], after he picked up an injury in the warm-up. So there were lots of things going against us, but I have to say it was a brilliant resolute performance. They did everything together, they worked so hard together and we could have even got another right at the end there from the penalty.
Source: whufc.com
77 – Arsenal had 77 touches in the opposition box against West Ham; the most on record (since 2008-09) in a single Premier League match for a team who failed to score. Blockage. pic.twitter.com/5bw9P8zGHo
— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe) December 28, 2023
Martin Odegaard on a bad night…
It’s one of those nights. We had a lot of chances and did enough to score some goals, but in the box, we were not good enough. We take the good things and learn from the things we didn’t do well. We created enough and had some big chances. We’re together as a team. It’s not about some players [not scoring]. We have to improve in front of the goal and it’s down to the whole team to do that.
Source: BBC Sport
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Ex-Gunner Dinos Mavropanos on his goal…
I think it’s the best moment to score my first goal for West Ham and in the Premier League. We work a lot on the set-pieces, so it was great. It is an important win for everyone and for our boss. We are really happy.
Source: Amazon Prime Video
Arsenal's top scorers are Nketiah & Saka with five goals.
14 teams have a player who has scored more goals than Arsenal's top scorer this season.
Villa
Bournemouth
Brentford
Brighton (2)
Chelsea (2)
Palace
Everton
Liverpool
City
Newcastle (3)
Forest
Spurs
West Ham (2)
Wolves.— Orbinho (@Orbinho) December 28, 2023
Arteta on the need for new camera angles to decide on whether the ball is in or out of play…
For sure, I think that will bring more clarity. The fact that it’s inconclusive with the technology that exists in the world nowadays is a little bit incredible. But that’s it. Regardless of that, I think we did more than enough in the game to win it.
Source: beIN SPORTS
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Thierry Henry on VAR not having the necessary cameras to decide on the ball being in or out of play…
We are in 2023, nearly 2024, and we still don’t have a camera from above. It’s too many times where you don’t know whether the ball is pulled back, the ball is out. Can we have a camera that can be above that we can see if the ball is out or not?
Source: Amazon Prime Video
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Ex-referee Mark Clattenburg on the VAR decision to allow West Ham’s opener…
There’s no other decision the officials can give. The on-field decision is a goal. We cannot be 100 per cent certain that the ball has gone out. As the ball has to be clearly over the line, there’s no conclusive evidence. The other point of reference they need is the ball, the ball is being blocked by Bowen’s thigh. Having cameras above, just have a chip in the ball.
Source: Amazon Prime Video
"The technology is not clear enough to understand if the ball went out."
Mikel Arteta has spoken about West Ham's first goal 🗣️#ARSWHU pic.twitter.com/eQLWJir9Ck
— Match of the Day (@BBCMOTD) December 28, 2023
Jarrod Bowen on West Ham’s win…
It’s a massive win! We knew it was going to be difficult as these are top side, but we managed to build on what we did against Manchester United. I think, for us, we haven’t been consistent enough. We might have won one game and then the Fulham game springs to mind when we conceded five, and if we want to be spoken about to go to the top six and finishing higher in the division then we need to be consistent.
Source: whufc.com
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Arteta on his players lacking confidence in the box…
I don’t think it’s that. You hit the post, or you hit the ball and it’s half a centimetre and you have I don’t know how many shots or someone blocks the shot and it doesn’t come in. We miss a lot of situations when we have to pick the right pass, there are two players free in the box and I can recall five, six actions of that and that’s what makes the difference to win the games.
Source: Post-game press conference [via Hayters]
📽️ On the Whistle: Arsenal 0-2 West Ham – "Poor in both boxes"https://t.co/ixIWD2i3fe
🔴⚪️ #AFC pic.twitter.com/J1YEa4Ygmw
— gunnerblog (@gunnerblog) December 29, 2023
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Arteta on what he told the team in the dressing room…
If they will continue to play like that, it is very unlikely that it will happen again. I just told them ‘Listen, we’re disappointed we lost at home. We have to go now to Fulham and play better if possible than today and win the game and that’s it.’
Source: Arsenal.com
Frustrating beyond belief.
But inches right? Saka hits the post and bounces out Mavrapounos, who will never head the ball placed that well again, hits the bar and goes in.
Poor. Not clinical enough, growing concern about our efficiency. Concerns remain about PGMOL, but we just have to be better. We’re never getting another VAR decision for the rest of the season. Ball is clearly out, you can see the whole line, and the ball between Bowen’s legs and nothing on the line, they refuse to stop it at the right frame. Clear penalty on Saka. nonetheless, we weren’t good enough either. Big stinky Turds!
You can see the gap between Bowen’s knee and the line, so the ball should be visible to be in. Arteta’s outburst at Newcastle will cost us all season with PGMOL getting embarrassed.
The outburst just brought it into focus. The agenda was already there.
100%. The agenda is real.
At least we have the hysterical “Angeball” to enjoy. So brave how they got eviscerated by Brighton! Such courage, wow
Can’t blame Mike for that performance, too many of our key players had a stinker. And just 10 goals between our front three players this season, that HAS to improve and quickly.
And I hope Tomi is back in the team ASAP, he is a better defender than Zinny!
Tomi is off to Asian cup in the next 10 days
It is not fair on Arsenal for Tomi and Partey to run off and play their continental cup at the first feeling of being fit. These guys have been missing for the employees for almost the entire season.
How many people aren’t better than Zinny at defending. If he stays in midfield, he is a midfielder. He can not play the inverted role convincingly.
When Timber is back next season, he won’t get a look in.
Both Jesus and Zinchenko were bit-part players at City and were not expected to play 50 games. It is much harder produce for a full campaign.
I don’t think we were poor in both boxes. We were just poor in their box and their game plan came off to perfection.
That aside, we had a situation just after their opening goal where Oliver is sure our ball went over the line and we couldn’t get a corner. We seem to be in a situation with the PGMOL where if the ref is not sure the decision goes against us first and they take it on from there. Guilty till proven innocent
And maybe it’s just me but every time I see a referee call go against us I really know it’s the norm. We had enough time and quality to turn it around but that wasn’t our best night
As for the PGMOL, well like the legendary Idi Amin Dada used to motivate his Olympians
https://twitter.com/_CrazyNairobian/status/1580932453463916544?t=dnSk4hdv1h1LrgsLnE0Uyw&s=19
Hairy balls Hammering against the arse! The blacksmiths forging an injustice to our rear-end. Grabbing on our lovehandles as we wrestle and bite the pillow! Woe! Terrible news!
West Ham home
Fulham away
Palace home
Forest away
4 games to take 12 points and lay down a massive marker and we blew it at the first hurdle. Dominated villa, can’t score, dominated west Han, can’t score. Dominated a few games at home, forest and wolves and just got over the line 2-1. Fulham with ten men dominate and draw. Needs addressing.
More VAR to improve the game? How many cameras will be needed to cover every inch of pitch? I think just scrap it all apart from goal line which generally works.
Didn’t need extra cameras last night – Bowen’s leg blocking camera was over the line, so ball must have been. Camera above? Would probably have an arm in the way!
Ref got it wrong, VAR was useless again to assist – at least before it was just one person at fault not 6.
To win the league we need a 20 goal striker. We don’t have one!
This defeat was a combination of poor and predictable tactics, great defending by West Ham, lack of composure creativity from our players and some bad luck. I have been complaining about our predictable tactics of always going wide for months now. Our passes are too slow and obvious. The opponent has so much time to defensively set up from the time we shift the ball from the left to Saka. Also when we run out of ideas we keep doing little stupid stupid chip crosses into the box when we don’t have that kind of player to win the headers.… Read more »
This is the story of this season in one match really. Around 30 shots on goal and nothing to show for it. Opposition have virtually no shots on target, but score them all, baring the penalty.
This is not the story of just this season. This has been going on since the Wenger era.
Reading all the comments in the player ratings and other posts, I am surprised by the power of “the narrative.” An awful lot on Zinchenko’s defensive liabilities–which were mostly irrelevant yesterday. I think the Zinchenko complaints come out whenever there is nothing to say about Raya. There are a fair amount of comments about the officiating, another irrelevancy. Hardly a word about how poorly Saka played (of course, he’s one of my favourites too) or how comparatively peripheral Rice was. Trossard was also poor. Blogs has this one right–we missed Havertz (or Xhaka, or Aaron Ramsey) at the left 8.… Read more »