Mikel Arteta was a happy man after watching his side earn a third successive 1-0 win on Thursday night in the UEFA Europa League.
Granit Xhaka’s second-half goal proved enough to earn all three points and book our place in the knock-out stages of the Europa League with two games to spare.
After the game the manager spoke with the media on the team performance, their qualification to the knockout stage and also praised Granite Xhaka.
Read Also:Arteta Urges Gunners To Show Improvement Ahead Of Liverpool Game
On the performance against PSV and what it means for the next stage, the Spaniard said;
“We are qualified so that’s the first step, so really pleased for doing that, now we want to achieve the second one which is to finish first in the group because we know the difference that’s going to make, in terms of the games that you have to play and against who, and that’s still something we have to do.
” In general I’m really pleased with the performance with what the boys have shown, and we had some really dominant and good moments in the game, but we lacked a little bit in the final third, final actions, especially inside the box.
“To put more shots on target and score more goals I think.
On Xhaka being captain and scoring the winnijg goal of the game Arteta said it was a well deserved one .
“He deserves that, he has faced adversity in difficult moments, he has put his arm up when he had something different to do, his work ethic, the way he is as a person, the way he treats everyone around the club, and the love for this football club and profession is unquestionable, he fully deserves that and I’m really happy to see him enjoying his career.
On the challenges of rotating the squad for Europa and Premier League.
They are giving we the right reasons to do so, and it wouldn’t be fair if I didn’t give them the opportunity to do that. Especially the way they behaved, trained, and care about the team. So I’m really happy everybody is participating, everybody feels part of it, which is really important and everybody is competing and putting in the performances which are needed to win the games.