Per Mertesacker, back in the lineup with Gabriel nursing a slight hamstring injury, spoke to the media, as reported by the club’s official website, after Arsenal’s dramatic 2-1 win against Leicester City.
We played well, especially in the first half defensively. How everyone dropped back and recovered well when we lost the ball was outstanding. We created a lot of chances and we were a bit unlucky with our finishing, we could have got the winner earlier but we will take it. The energy creates such a finish and you could see the fans were absolutely delighted.
However, right before half-time, Nacho Monreal brought down Jamie Vardy in the penalty area and the Gunners were a goal down at the break, with the England international converting his 19th goal of the campaign.
We have to take it. They were maybe a bit lucky with the penalty but if there is contact then it is a penalty. On the second occasion when they got a player sent off, we might have been a bit lucky. That is the game. We tried to stick to our game and not be influenced by the referee’s decision. That is what we tried to do the whole game and I think it makes a difference in the end. If you think too much about situations then you will lose yourself and we kept going and that is why we won today.
Mertesacker was alluding to Danny Simpson being sent off in the 54th minute for his second yellow card, which was the turning point in the match.
I said to the lads to keep believing, keep going and we need to put pressure on them, but that is a breathtaking finish from Danny Welbeck. You see every player can make a difference in this squad and we are happy to have him back. You could see his impact.
Welbeck made his season debut in the 83rd minute for Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain (his first appearance in over 10 months), and wound up scoring the winning-goal in the dying moments of the match, off a sublime free kick from Mesut Ozil.
That free kick was the result of a reckless foul by Marcin Wasilewski, in the 94th minute on Monreal. The experienced defender was brought into the game after Simpson was sent off.
When asked about the criticism leveled at Arsene Wenger for his recent substitution decisions, Mertesacker quashed such talk.
We haven’t spoken about that. We are not looking too much at the rumours and the press so we tried to concentrate and we are in a good situation. That is why we concentrate on ourselves and not about rumours. You said about criticism about the manager, so we don’t look at that. Every player counts and every player contributes and you could see that today.
As it turned out, Wenger’s decisions turned out to be essential to Arsenal’s victory. Prior to him to sending Welbeck on, he put Theo Walcott in the game after 60 minutes, who Scored the Gunners’ first goal 10 minutes later.
There was a drought in January with the results but we came back strongly against Bournemouth. We need it, if you want to challenge for anything in this league you need to win. We proved it on the pitch today and when we look at training sessions everyone is focused on what is coming up.
If not for Welbeck’s heroics, the Gunners would’ve fallen five points behind the leaders and critics of the clubs pointing to another February swoon.
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