Having seen his team beat Porto on penalties to progress in the Champions League, Mikel Arteta was thrown plenty of questions in his post-match press conference.
He was asked about reaching the quarter-finals, our penalty practice, David Raya's heroics and much more.
Here is everything he had to say:
on his emotions after winning on penalties:
Magic, what we expected, a really tough opponent, really well organised, very difficult to generate constant momentum in the game in the way they play and that’s credit to them. We did it, we scored a beautiful goal, they insisted in different ways, in the way the game allowed as well, and it’s such a huge experience for us. We had to do it at the end with the penalties, we prepared well, and credit to the coaches as well for the way they did it and obviously for David [Raya]. He had some difficult moments to start but he stood up, had an incredible personality and ambition, and at the end he got rewarded with his moment.
on the impact tonight’s result can have on the squad:
For them to do it when the club hasn’t managed to do it for 14 years, it tells you the difficulty of it. When the margins are so small, we found a way to do it again. I see how much they want it, and how much they try, they are able to sacrifice anything to win and when you play like this at the end it’s going to come your way sooner or later and it happened tonight.
on whether he has experienced an atmosphere like tonight before:
Probably not, it was amazing - from the start to the end. When they have to do that extra at the end with the penalties, apart from bringing that, they were so smart in the way they did it, and the way they helped us. A huge thank you because with them we are much better and I think today they have impacted the game in a really strong way.
on the way we set up to win against Porto:
We always play, if not I don’t know how you are top of the league in the Premier League, it’s the best league in the world.
on our penalty takers all having experience in that scenario:
I didn’t think that, but it’s a great point. Probably a great experience, because that experience is much more real than what we’ve done in the last two days, just in case we had to go through that tonight. They looked really composed, the boys. The way they took the penalties was superb and David [Raya] contributed in his big way as well.
on whether he was comfortable going into penalties:
No, because practising in the training ground, a few of them missed by the way yesterday, not today. We prepare everything, the extra-time, the scenarios, the changes, how the players have to drink and eat and all that and in the end, you have to do it in the game, and to replicate the scenarios is really difficult. Total credit to the boys, stepping up with maturity, with that confidence and they delivered.
on how important the result was for the squad’s mentality this season:
It’s another big step, especially as a club. The last seven years we haven’t been in this competition, the last 14 we haven’t been where we are today. That’s the difficulty of it, the best thing is we are not satisfied, we want more and we are going to try to go through the next round for sure.
on David Raya’s performance proving his worth:
I don’t have to see him today, I was very convinced that was going to be the case. You see in the first few days here and what he had to go through and how he did it with that composure. You look at his body language, and the position that he takes, he doesn’t get very affected and that’s a key quality for a goalkeeper.
on his learnings from the two legs in the Champions League:
Having experience, I haven’t done it before as you said. It’s the first time I’ve done anything in the Champions League, and to try to learn every single day, you get advice. That’s why you have great coaches around you, great people as well to help you and make you better.
on Odegaard’s goal being disallowed:
I haven’t seen the replay. Live, I could not understand, but if he made that decision, maybe there was something there. I’m sure we are not going to remember that, we are going to remember that we did it in a special way.
on how far ahead we can start to look after this result:
It’s still very far, and now when I sit at home I’m going to look at the teams who we have to play and you start another big mountain to climb.
on whether a defeat would have affected the rest of the season:
That’s the way that we have to look at it right now. If you are out you think one less competition, we can focus on the league, more time to prepare for games but now the energy that it brings amongst the squad, amongst the club it’s really powerful.
on what he expects from the rest of the competition:
Really, really happy, obviously we want more. Let’s wait on who we have to play again.
on what happened at the final whistle between him and Sergio Conceicao:
No comment. Thank you very much.
Copyright 2024 The Arsenal Football Club Limited. Permission to use quotations from this article is granted subject to appropriate credit being given to www.arsenal.com as the source.
