Every word Mikel Arteta said on Liverpool draw, Arsenal mistakes, Gyokeres and title race

Here is every word from Mikel Arteta’s post-match press conference after Arsenal’s clash with Liverpool

Mikel Arteta faced the media following his Arsenal’s side’s Premier League meeting with Liverpool at the Emirates Stadium. The game ended in a goalless draw as the Gunners failed to capitalise on their rivals’ own draws in their respective games.

The side continued to surrender possession to their opponents, who, before the game, had come in for plenty of criticism themselves for recent displays. But without several of their main attacking players, they looked more threatening for most of the game.

Arteta faced questions on the struggles shown by many of his players on the night, and on some of the emotional moments in the game too.

Here is every word from Arteta’s post-match press conference:

What are your reflections on the game?

Well, obviously we wanted to win the game, unfortunately we didn’t manage to do that in the first half, we were much closer to that with the amount of situations and the spaces that we arrived into, normally you have to pick somebody in the box and it’s a vote, and we had much more domination. In the second half we struggled to dominate the game more through two things, one because we gave some very unnecessary goals away, and that didn’t allow us to travel together as a team, and when you don’t do that you are not compact and they start to drop everybody behind the ball and through the midfield, without having any presence in the box obviously, but they have the ball without really… because I don’t think they had a single shot on target tonight, but we struggled more to dominate the game and to be a threat in the opposition box.

You mentioned there that in the first half those passes where someone should have been to you, is that a problem with the passes, the movement?

The movement was there, the arrival was there, the players were there, there are two or three that they come across and we need to occupy a space that we didn’t occupy to score the ball, but in many other locations the situation was there, but against Villar we were excellent at that and every time we do that, and that’s why you win those big matches, and today we missed that, but with missing that at least we were so disciplined that we didn’t concede absolutely anything to the Champions.

You’ve had an excellent season with six points clear still in the table, does tonight feel like a missed opportunity?

Yeah, every time you don’t win, but then we would have been 12, 15 or 20 points ahead, I have to really praise the players individually for what they’ve done in this Christmas period, because the demands on the schedule are unbelievable and what they’ve done is remarkable, so to come out of this period with all the issues that we had in the strong position that we are, I think the boys deserve my credit and everybody’s recognition.

There’s a little bit of frustration at the end with some of the fans who didn’t get the win, but what would you say to those fans that you’re still six points clear?

We’ll go again, thank you so much for the atmosphere again and being always behind the team, and that’s it, we’re in a really strong position and we have to keep going, because it’s still very early in the season and we need them.

Gabi Martinelli’s getting a lot of stick for pushing Bradley, what did you make of that?

Knowing Gabi, if anybody knows Gabi, he’s an incredible, lovely guy, and probably he didn’t realise what happened, I hope that Conor as well, I will have a word with him now to understand that, but probably he didn’t recognise what happened.

It feels a bit like every point is a grind, a slog, how hard do you have to work to get every single point on the board?

I had this feeling since August, and I think we all have the same, every manager, every player, every team, because this is the level of this league and you see how difficult it is.

Does that make you feel anything different about your own team or how they feel about it?

Very proud.

Do you think they’re finding it very hard?

What it makes me feel very proud is because I know how difficult it is and I recognise what they’re doing.

In the first half you did have a few chances, obviously a few crosses flashed through the box to no avail, Viktor Gyokeres didn’t seem to be getting near the crosses, we’ve also spoken about how the team-mates need to adapt to their team-mates, why is he failing to make most of these chances?

He was in great position sometimes the ball didn’t arrive and as I said there was a situation, normally we’re going to the six yard box almost with the ball in the feet, and normally that’s a goal, you pick somebody and you score a goal, and we didn’t do that, and that’s the thing today, we have to improve, apart from the thing we did in the second half, that it wasn’t probably at the standards that we are used to.

Do you think he’s getting better?

Yes.

21 games, six points clear, if you had to pinpoint one thing you’re most happy about, what would that be?

The desire that they have to win, and the consistency that they are showing, with the schedule that we have in front of us, and the situation that we have to deal with, I think what they’re doing is remarkable, and we want to continue to improve and learn, and every game is an opportunity to do that, so tonight as well, against the actual champions, let’s not forget that, they are an incredible team, and today we have to reflect on that, and tomorrow we’ll go again because we have another game on Sunday.