Mikel Arteta shares what made him so proud of Arsenal display

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Mikel Arteta has labelled Arsenal’s performance while playing with nine men incredible as the Gunners were beaten 2-1 by Wolves in a remarkable game at Molineux, in comments reported by Football London.

Arsenal looked to be on their way to another impressive win on Tuesday. Nicolas Pepe scored an outstanding goal after Bukayo Saka had already had an effort ruled out for an offside.

However, the game unravelled just before half-time. David Luiz was sent off after Willian Jose’s leg caught his knee. And Wolves converted the subsequent penalty.

Unfortunately, Luiz was not the only Arsenal player to be dismissed. Wolves took the lead shortly after the break. And Bernd Leno saw red later on after handling outside the box.

The visitors had to play the final 18 minutes with nine men. But Arteta insisted that he could not be happier with the application shown by his players in the final stages of the contest.

“The way the boys were trying in the second half, they wanted to win the game with ten men,” he said, as reported by Football London. “That was the spirit from that dressing room.

“With nine players I saw players chasing the goalkeeper, it’s incredible and I’m so proud of them and it’s a shame that we cannot come away from the ground today with three points.”

That spirit shown late on will encourage Arteta. Arsenal will feel hard done by – particularly after the decision to send Luiz off.

The frustration seemed to galvanise the Gunners in the latter stages of Tuesday’s game. And Arteta will be hoping that they can utilise that same disappointment heading into their weekend game with Aston Villa.

They were scintillating early on. And they showed real fight at the end. So you could understand why Arteta felt that there were positives to take from the game.