Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger has admitted Arsenal need to finish in the top three at the end of the season.
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Having blown leads in back-to-back Premier League games to put a top-four finish at risk, Wenger said it had been important to score early on the way to a comfortable victory. “It looks like they’re going to limp into the top four again and that, for me, is boring”.
Arsenal were mathematically ruled out of the title race by Leicester’s thrashing of Swansea later in the day, and Wenger conceded his disappointment: “It is frustrating because we play to win the title”. They look full of energy and that has to come from the manager – he has to set the hunger.
Asked who Arsenal should target in the summer, Ray replied: ‘Robert Lewandowski, if they can get him.
That is a realistic target as they are now five points clear of fifth-placed Manchester United, but calls for change at the helm have grown louder with some fans at recent matches demanding Wenger should go. When you have to play Champions League qualifiers the European Championship is still going on.
The game might have turned on two penalty appeals, both of which were turned down by referee Mike Dean after Per Mertesacker blocked Jermain Defoe’s shot with his arms before Alex Iwobi’s effort ricocheted into DeAndre Yedlin’s arm. He has responded very well, because he said “okay, I will work harder and more”. “He’s turned his back on the ball and his arm is outstretched and stopped what is a certain goal I think”.
“Yes, for me definitely 100 per cent a penalty”.
That may not be enough to appease some of Arsene Wenger’s increasingly vocal critics but the Gunners boss knows third place still represents a respectable return and would see them go straight into the group stages of the competition.
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Smith said, as quoted by the London Evening Standard: “They’ve got to be extremely careful because they’re not in the best of form and you hope the players can lift themselves. You never know what happens in front of you”, he added.
