Arsenal’s disappointment and emotion gives me hope

Mike Arteta said following Thursday’s defeat, “It hurts, big time. We had a lot of hope in this competition. We created enough chances to win the game, but if you concede two set pieces again in a tie like this, you put yourself in big trouble. I just want to concentrate now on lifting the players. I have to lift them, that’s my job. First of all we have to digest it, because that was very painful tonight.”

“Champions realise that defeat, and learning from it, is part of the path to mastery.”
― Rasheed Ogunlaru

It took Arsenal almost 105 minutes to find any rhythm at the Emirates on Thursday night. As the boss said, two costly mistakes on set pieces cost the Gunners a chance to move on to the Europa League’s Round of 16 competition. Now, we have only the Premier League and FA Cup remaining to fight for a place in next season’s European competitions.

Pierre-Emerick Aubametang’s bicycle kick goal gave us hope with 6 minutes remaining in the 2nd half of extra time. Again, this showed his brilliance in front of goal, however, in the closing seconds, Auba’s tired right foot missed wide on what would have been a game and a tie winner. Yet, it was not to be on this night in north London.

It’s a tough pill to swallow, however, the disappointment I saw on our players faces at the final whistle gives me hope. Why, you ask? Because the pain and emotion they showed is a reflection of their renewed belief as professionals and as Arsenal players. To a man, they gave everything they had on the pitch to get the win. Was it their best performance? No, but it proved they are willing to lay everything they have on the line for this club.

I expect a much stronger performance at Portsmouth on Monday. I expect they will be hungry to erase those images from their minds of Olympiacos celebrating at the end of the match. I expect a full out onslaught of Portsmouth.

Our lads will be hungry to get the club back on the winning track again.

COYG, let’s regroup and kick some Portsmouth butt on Monday!

Cheers. Gunner1953