Mikel Arteta was crestfallen after Arsenal’s defeat to West Ham (Photo: Amazon Prime)
Mikel Arteta says the technology VAR are using is ‘not good enough’ after West Ham scored a controversial goal in their win over Arsenal.
The Gunners missed an opportunity to got top of the Premier League after shockingly losing 2-0 to the Irons at the Emirates on Thursday night.
Tomas Soucek scored the opener before a goal from former Arsenal defender Konstantinos Mavropanos sealed the victory as Mikel Arteta’s side missed numerous chances.
There was controversy surrounding Soucek’s strike however, as the ball appeared to go out of play in the build-up but VAR could not rule it out as it could not conclusively prove it had fully crossed the line.
The incident echoed Newcastle’s winning goal against Arsenal earlier this season, which had prompted Arteta’s infamous rant on the referees.
The manager was far more reserved and measured this time around however, and when asked about the Soucek goal he repeatedly said he hadn’t seen it – reminiscent of legendary Gunners boss Arsene Wenger’s famous ‘I did not see it’ remark.
‘I haven’t seen it. They’re saying it’s not conclusive from the images they have,’ Arteta said in his post-match press conference.
‘It’s just a shame that with the technology that we have that we can’t say if it’s clearly in.
‘The technology that we have at the moment is not good enough to give us that answer so we have to – without that – win the game with the amount of situations that we created in the game.
‘It’s done, it’s gone and there’s nothing we can do about it now. It is [one of the most frustrating nights of my managerial career]. But it’s football.
‘Normally when the team generates so much it’s going to win games. That’s the way we’ve done it. Against Brighton, we generated so much and against Liverpool as well, but we score goals in different ways.
‘We have to make another step in that area to win games more comfortably that’s for sure because today the team deserves to win the game. There’s no question about that.’
It was West Ham star Jarrod Bowen who had kept the ball seemingly in play, andeven the forward admitted he had no idea whether it had crossed the line or not.
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Just like Arteta, the England star told Amazon Prime: ‘I haven’t seen it.
‘It’s difficult because the ball was in the air. It was hard to tell. It would have been easier to tell if it had been on the ground.
‘It was really important to get the first goal. We’ve won tonight. We need to take one game at a time. It sounds boring but we have to keep getting results.’
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