Mikel Arteta bemoaned “horrible defensive habits” as Arsenal fell “nowhere near the level required” despite beating Wolves 2-1 at the Emirates Stadium.
Arsenal needed a 94th-minute own goal from Yerson Mosquera to see off bottom-side Wolves after a pedestrian first 45 minutes.
Bukayo Saka’s whipped corner eluded Wolves goalkeeper Sam Johnstone, struck the post, and went in off the keeper in the 70th minute.
The Premier League leaders appeared home and dry, until Tolu Arokodare popped up with a stoppage-time equaliser.
Gunners captain and man of the match, Bukayo Saka, was on hand to save the day. It was his delightful cross that allowed Gabriel Jesus to pressure Mosquera to put through his own net.
Arteta admitted there was relief at full-time, but his focus quickly shifted to what he felt Arsenal got wrong rather than the result itself.
Arteta relieved as Arsenal beat Wolves
“It was a relief, but a very clear understanding that the margin should have been bigger,” he said.
“After not being precise enough in the first half, with the amount of situations that we generated inside the opposition box.
We didn’t pick the right colour of shirt on so many occasions; we had an overload to do that.”
The Arsenal boss was particularly unhappy with a brief lapse after his side took the lead, which allowed Wolves back into the contest despite having offered little threat.
“After we had a period of two or three minutes in deep, totally passive, with horrible defensive habits.
“That is nowhere near the level that is required against a team that hasn’t had a single shot.
“The first time that they had the opportunity to do it, they scored the goal, and this is the Premier League.”
Image credit: Ank Kumar, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0
Below standards despite show of character
Arteta shut down any suggestion that the late winner reflected resilience or character.
“I don’t put it down sometimes to, yeah, resilience and goal,” he said. “We should have stopped the source before, and that’s on us. We made it even harder with what we did in the manner that we conceded the goal, and that’s unacceptable.”
He also pointed to poor decision-making in the final third as a major reason Arsenal failed to put Wolves away earlier in the contest.
“When you have a free metre, normally we put the ball not on target and go, and we put it out and time and time and time again, it is frustrating,” Arteta added.
“You have to hit the back post every single time at this level, and today we haven’t done it, so we started to make things more difficult for us.”
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