Mikel Arteta blamed individual errors for Arsenal’s 3-2 defeat against Manchester United, on a weekend when their lead in the Premier League title race was cut to four points.
Arsenal were 1-0 up when the game was transformed by Martín Zubimendi’s mis‑hit back-pass, which presented Bryan Mbeumo with an equaliser. United scored with outstanding strikes from distance by Patrick Dorgu and Matheus Cunha in the second half to stun the leaders.
“The first half an hour we’re very dominant,” Arteta said, “playing the areas that we wanted, scored a goal, had two fantastic chances to score another one. And after that, we gave them the goal.”
Zubimendi’s mistake was not the only Arsenal error, perhaps a result of the successive goalless draws in the previous Premier League games ramping up a sense of anxiety.
“The first error leads to the second one,” Arteta said. “There were three or four, which is very unusual today – but they are part of football and today we got punished. In the end, we have to show the mental strength we have on matchdays.”
Arteta resisted the temptation to complain about two possible handballs – the ball may have brushed Dorgu’s hand before he lashed in the goal that put United 2-1 up, although replays were not conclusive, while a shot hit Harry Maguire’s hand which was presumably deemed not to be an offence because it was breaking his fall.
Arteta said: “With the changes, we managed to shift the energy, scored the second goal, and you could feel that everything changed and the game was there to go and win it. In the next action, Noni [Madueke] is one v one in the six-yard box. We don’t get anything out of that. It goes to a goal-kick … one pass, win the duel, and Cunha puts it in the perfect angle to lose all the momentum, all the good energy that we were building up and to go and win the game for them.”
The Arsenal manager also refused to be critical of fans who gave the home side a smattering of boos at half-time. “We have to do more, and when we do that we can rest in peace.”
Michael Carrick, who has overseen impressive wins against the top two in his first two matches in interim charge of United, praised the game intelligence of his players. “We understood the flow of the game,” he said. “At times we were going to be a little bit up against it and digging in. You’ve got to take a bit of control and calm things down a bit. And we got two fantastic goals.”
