Defeat to Manchester United must make Arsenal more determined – Arsene Wenger

• Posted on December 4, 2017
• by Nana Kwesi Coomson
• Comment

Arsene Wenger wants his Arsenal team to use their loss to Manchester United as motivation for the rest of the campaign.

The Gunners produced some fine attacking play during a Saturday night thriller but were undone by defensive errors and a brilliant display from United goalkeeper David de Gea, eventually losinh 3-1.

However, Wenger thinks his team can take encouragement from the performance, believing they have shown the brand of football they are capable of producing.

“I believe from the game, it has to make us angry and even more determined,” said Wenger.

“If I am a player, and I think with what we produced, we have a huge potential, and we lose the game. We cannot accept that.

“That’s what you want, the players have produced a quality performance. What makes you angry is that you produce that performance and, in the end, you have nothing to show for it. That’s very difficult to accept.”

Sixth-place Tottenham have been ruled out of the title race by boss Mauricio Pochettino but, despite being 15 points behind leaders Manchester City, Wenger does not accept that Arsenal’s challenge is over.

“I am not Pochettino, I am Arsene Wenger,” said the Frenchman. “I am here to fight as long as I can.

“As long as mathematically it’s possible, you have to fight. You cannot give any other message out.”

Although Laurent Koscielny and Shkodran Mustafi made errors which led to United goals in the opening 11 minutes on Saturday, Wenger is refusing to seek scapegoats for the loss.

“I am not here to especially blame people,” he added. “I want Arsenal Football Club to win. When the performance is of that quality, we have to be efficient.

“We are in this job to be efficient, you know. So I blame first myself. The crowd was outstanding and the team was outstanding.

“But, we were not efficient. I cannot deny that. They scored three, we scored one.”

-Skysports