Arsenal misses chance to go top in 4-0 rout by Southampton

The game at St Mary’s could have offered Arsenal a chance to go top of the Premier League, but after a poor performance they returned to north London reeling from a shock 4-0 defeat. It’s a disappointing result, I have to say well done Southampton.

“Decisions of the referee you cannot master, but our own behaviour we can and on that front I believe Southampton looked stronger in the challenges and we lost too many tonight”.

Arsenal players were furious with referee Jon Moss for allowing the goal as Koscielny tumbled under pressure from Long in the build-up.

“The mood is again good, and it has to be good, because if we’re preparing for the next one you have to learn why we lost and take out the positive things”, he told Southampton’s official website.

“We had a game where nothing was really happening for us and everything was happening for them”.

Per Mertesacker looked slow as Long danced or barged past him on occasions, and to a neutral it appeared that Laurent Koscielny was simply outmuscled, first by Long and then Jose Fonte, for the second and third goals.

The result means that Arsenal, who have won 11 of their 18 matches to date so far this season, missed the chance to replace Leicester City at the top of the Premier League table, despite the latter’s Boxing Day loss to Liverpool. “My mistake is thinking that those players think like I do”.

Arsenal welcome Premier League newcomers Bournemouth to the Emirates in an evening kickoff on Monday, and Wenger is confident that his charges will bounce back. Football is pragmatic and nobody can predict what will happen in the next 17 games, for example, so we want to go just with the same attitude and same spirit and earn the right to win the games.

Arsenal attempted to capitalise as Theo Walcott forced the returning Maarten Stekelenburg into a save, before the inexplicably-unmarked Southampton academy graduate headed wide from a corner.

This does does not sound very impressive, but between injuries and the form of Italy’s top man Graziano Pelle he has not played too many games at St Mary’s this term. The second half was flawless, great organisation and we created a lot of problems for them.

– Cuco Martina was the first player from Curacao to score a Premier League goal – 93 different nationalities have now scored in the competition.

Goals usually interest me but not today as while I would favour under 2.5, I’m much keener on the straight Arsenal win, and that’s a bigger price.