Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta has admitted that his side gifted Manchester City all three points in Wednesday's 3-1 defeat to the Premier League champions.
The Gunners have finally been knocked off the top of the Premier League courtesy of their loss in the top-of-the-table clash, where Kevin De Bruyne drew first blood in the first half.
Bukayo Saka levelled for the Gunners just before the break, but second-half strikes from Jack Grealish and Erling Braut Haaland in front of the away end condemned Arsenal to defeat.
City have now usurped Arsenal in first place, although the Citizens are only ahead on goal difference having played a game more, and Arteta lamented costly mistakes which threw the game away for his side.
"That's the frustration - it's exceptionally difficult to play at the level that they require you to play at to have the chance to win," arsenal.com quotes Arteta as saying in his post-game press conference.
© Reuters
"I think we've done it and in many moments we had them, but if you give three goals the way we did - just give them the game - and especially when you don't put the big chances that we had away, the margin of error for them is almost zero. It's a shame because we really had them.
"We lost it - I think we lost it. We have to move on because the performance was there in many situations. For our team to play at the level that we have to play at to reach that, it's very difficult and the boys did exceptionally well. The atmosphere was just incredible and the shame is just that we didn't get the points."
Takehiro Tomiyasu's mishit backpass laid the ball on a plate for De Bruyne to open the scoring, but Ederson was then adjudged to have fouled Eddie Nketiah inside the area as Saka stepped up to equalise.
However, defensive errors continued to bedevil the North London giants, whose attempts to play out from the back ended with City taking the lead through Grealish's effort, which took a slight deflection off Tomiyasu past Aaron Ramsdale.
Haaland's 26th Premier League goal of the season put the tie to bed in the 82nd minute, and Arteta admitted that his players "didn't understand" their tasks after Man City altered their shape.
© Reuters
"We did a lot of simple things wrong and put ourselves in trouble," the Spaniard added. "Gabriel [Magalhaes] was out and we played a quick free-kick and suddenly we were in trouble.
"We gave it away in areas that are impossible [to give the ball away in] against them if you don't want your goal to be threatened. When errors happen as part of the risks we take, the risk and reward is understanding what we have to do.
"We didn't understand well what we had to do, especially in the second half, when they changed their formation and went in a different shape. But we came out of there a lot of times and created big problems for them, so it's always that balance.
"I don't know if it's experience, or it's bad luck, I've never seen Tomiyasu make that backpass in seven years and he did it today. It's part of it, and obviously, they have the quality to punish you."
Arsenal can temporarily rise back to the top of the table when they meet Unai Emery's Aston Villa on Saturday lunchtime before City face Nottingham Forest later that day.
No Data Analysis info
