Mikel Arteta urges Arsenal players to ‘respond’ to Aston Villa defeat as Manchester City take lead in title race

Arsenal suffered a potentially costly defeat to Aston Villa (Picture: YouTube)

Mikel Arteta insists his Arsenal team need to ‘respond’ after a potentially costly defeat to Aston Villa left Manchester City two points clear in the Premier League title race.

The Gunners would have been buoyed by Liverpool’s shock defeat to Crystal Palace earlier in the day but then slipped up themselves against Villa.

In an entertaining and end-to-end affair, Villa scored twice in the final ten minutes through Leon Bailey and Ollie Watkins to dent Arsenal’s title charge and boost their own hopes of qualifying for the Champions League.

The defeat leaves Arsenal second in the Premier League, level on points with Liverpool and two behind defending champions Manchester City, while Villa move three points ahead of fifth-placed Tottenham.

Arteta said: ‘Two very different performances. The first half was superb, one of the best halves we have played against a top team. It should have been three or four – or more.

‘We didn’t put that score line up and didn’t reflect that second half. We lacked momentum. We didn’t have the flow we had in the first half and then we conceded two very, very poor goals.

‘Credit to them, in the second half we were a bit unprecise with the ball, we weren’t able to do what we did in the first half. In the end we lost it so we have to congratulate them on the points.’

Villa scored two late goals to down the Gunners (Picture: Getty)

Arsenal had 18 shots against Aston Villa – 14 of which came in the first-half – but could not find a way past former Gunners goalkeeper Emiliano Martinez.

On his side’s efforts in front of goal, Arteta added: ‘When you are at this level, you have to punish them, it is not like you can do that for 90-95 minutes against a top opponent.

‘If you can’t do that then at least don’t concede. We couldn’t do that. We have to be more patient in the second half to find our moments. We were trying to do that with the changes but that’s when we conceded.’

Arsenal travel to Germany on Wednesday for the second leg of their Champions League quarter-final. Bayern Munich secured a 2-2 draw in the first leg at the Emirates Stadium.

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