“I think if Shane Long had put his chance in one on one then it’s a different game, but those situations and little moments in the game are what define them”.
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He added: “We could earlier maybe have had one or two penalties at corners”.
Madley’s stoppage-time decision was a third penalty – all successfully converted – given against Southampton this season and Puel said: “I don’t like to speak of decisions of the referee but three penalties in four games is a bit much”.
And Cech admits there is room for improvement in Arsenal’s game as they look to avoid the kind of start they endured in last season’s group stage when they lost their opening two games to Dinamo Zagreb and Olympiacos.
However, the victory came at a cost for the Gunners after Koscielny was caught by a kick to the face just before José Fonte’s penalty against Olivier Giroud.
Forward Lucas Perez and defender Shkodran Mustafi made their Gunners debuts, but Wenger admitted they were not at their best.
“They were a bit surprised by the pace and the commitment of the Premier League [but] they will adapt to that”.
“I feel both are short [of fitness] a bit, they lack competition and their second half was much better than their first half”.
“It’s devastating because of all the hard work we put into the game”, he said. Southampton had many threats on the counter-attack, but in the end we got the penalty.
“When you lose your first home game, you can not afford to drop points in the second home game because it creates a little bit of anxiety at home and that’s not what we really want”.
“When you lose the first home game you can not afford to drop points in the second”.
“Obviously we did so, so we are happy with the three points and we go game by game and try to improve every day”.
Southampton manager Claude Puel spoke on their loss to Arsenal, including the late penalty setting up the game winning goal.
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Southampton’s next match is the first of their Europa League campaign, at home to Sparta Prague on Thursday.
