'Very painful' - Mikel Arteta vents frustration over 'strange' defeat to Man Utd as Arsenal's title aspirations take major hit

Arsenal suffered their first home defeat of the season on Sunday as Michael Carrick made it two wins from two since being installed as Manchester United's caretaker boss until the end of the season. The result means that Arsenal's lead over Manchester City and Aston Villa at the top of the Premier League table has been cut to just four points and breathes fresh life into the title race. It's also the first time Arsenal have conceded three goals in a match since December 2023 and means they have now failed to win in their last three Premier League games in a row.

Arteta reflected on the loss after the game, telling Sky Sports: "First of all you have to congratulate Man Utd for the victory.  It happened in a really strange way to be fair.  We were so dominant in the first half an hour, scored the goal, had another two brilliant chances to score, and then we give them the goal, which is very unusual from our side. That changed and shifted the momentum a little bit. After that we dropped the standards with the ball, and the game wasn't in our control, and they had two magic moments.  Credit to them because in big games you need those moments. We carried the negativity a bit and didn't have the fluidity that we needed. But then we made the changes, scored the goal, and you could feel at 2-2, game on.   Everything changed immediately, but then one long ball, one pass, and Cunha scored. A very painful one but it's time to be close to the players who gave us great moments. We all want to win. We have to learn from it. Defeats are part of winning, and we have to take them like this, because they need to be reminded how good they are."

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Arsenal captain Martin Odegaard said his team simply weren't good enough against the Red Devils. He told Sky Sports: "It was not good enough from us and we need some time to analyse it. We should've done better but now is the time to stick together more, keep working, push each other more and bounce back. First half we were the better team, we scored a goal and had control but a lot of giveaways. We managed to get to 2-2 but then they scored straight away. It's never going to be easy in this league, we know that. I thought we were well prepared for the game, we started the game well and in the second we saw the momentum change a bit. The performance definitely should've been better from us and we have to take the lesson and keep working. Every game is a big challenge, this is part of football. We are still top of the league so we have to keep going and bounce back straight away, that's the only medicine."

Arsenal return to action in the Champions League against Kairat but have already secured a place in the knockout stages of the competition. The Gunners' next Premier League game is a trip to Elland Road to face Leeds. Daniel Farke's side are on a decent run of form and have lost just one of their last 10 games in all competitions but were hammered 5-0 by Arsenal at the Emirates when the two sides met at the start of the season.