Per Mertesacker slams Arsenal following “shocking” performance against Stoke City…
Arsenal’s captain on the day Per Mertesacker is under no illusions over just how bad his side were against Stoke City on Saturday, and branded their performance “shocking”, when talking on Arsenal.com.
SEE MORE:
Football Manager 2015 – Top Free Agents In FM15, Ex-Arsenal, Manchester United, & Barcelona Stars Included
Arsenal Arsene Wenger: Why Arsenal must stand by Arsene Wenger despite growing calls for the Frenchman to be sacked.
Southampton V Man United: Live Streaming & Premier League Preview
Arsene Wenger’s boys crashed to a 3-2 defeat against Stoke, with the Gunners trailing 3-0 at half time after a woeful defensive performance.
Despite a marginally better second half showing, Arsenal were unable to come away from the Britannia stadium with anything. The German World Cup winner knows how bad they were in the first half, but tried to look for positives out of the game.
“We nearly came back from a shocking first half,” he said.
“We had to show some morale and some respect to our travelling fans.
“At half-time we said to ourselves, ‘we’re going to fight until the end no matter what happens’. That was the only positive thing. We’re not normally like that, so it’s a big regret.
“We have a few problems. We have had a couple of games in the last two weeks so we had to shuffle around a bit and sometimes when you’re not used to a position, you can find yourself one or two yards from the right position.
“That’s not an excuse – overall we lacked a lot of things, especially in the first half, and we tried to turn it around and keep our chins up to give ourselves a much better position.
“At the end, with 10 men, it was even more difficult but we kept going and tried everything.”
Arsenal are currently in sixth place in the Premier League, but are the same distance from league leaders Chelsea as Leicester City at the foot of the table.
Wenger clearly needs to make a signing or two in January, but with a busy Christmas schedule in between now and start of the window, Arsenal need to shape up or find them in a position that is impossible to come back from.