The six points given up to Manchester City this year, according to Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta, lost them the title.
Many people see the draws against Liverpool, West Ham, and Southampton as pivotal moments, but Arteta believes City’s home and away victories were the deciding factors.
When you are up 2-0 at Anfield and draw the game in the 90th minute, and then you play West Ham and are up 2-0 after 20 minutes, completely dominating, and miss a penalty, you have to win that game, he said to arsenal.com. Then Southampton comes along, and you essentially hand them two goals, forcing you to scale a mountain. We had a chance to win it at the very end, but instead we drew 3-3, making the fourth game against City critical.
Fair enough, they were a lot better than we were. When they play at that level, it’s just “wow,” like when they did against Real Madrid the other day. We failed to get there. The team paid a high psychological price for that.
Looking back, we could have finished second even if we had won at Anfield and against West Ham and Southampton. In the end, you have to defeat them when you face off against them because it would be a difference of 12 points—six for us versus six for them.
However, Arteta feels that this season has a lot going for noit.
