Arsenal stands for a tough battle to reach the Champions League final after he was defeated by PSG in the first stage of their semi-final and Alan Shearer believes he knows who is to blame
Alan Shearer pointed his finger on Thomas Partey for the defeat of Arsenal against PSG on Tuesday evening. The Gunners slid to a 1-0 loss in the first stage of their semi-final of the Champions League against the men of Luis Enrique.
Ousmane Dembele only scored the only goal of the match for three minutes when he wiped the ball home from the cutback of Joao Neves. It leaves the side of Mikel Arteta opposite a tough fight to reach their first Champions League final since 2006.
For the second stage of next week in the Parc des Princes, they are stimulated by the return of the most important midfielder Pedey. The Ghanaian was suspended for the defeat on Tuesday after he was booked in the final phase of the quarterfinals victory over Real Madrid.
That booking meant that he was forced to sit out the first stage against PSG. In his place, Boss Arteta chose to bring Mikel Merino back to the midfield of his role as an emergency striker.
Declan Rice was then moved to the in -depth role of Pitey, after he had played heavily in a similar position for West Ham. But Shearer has insisted that PSG's early goal could have been stopped if Pitey had been on the field.
He said in comment on Prime Video: “I'm not sure if they would have had that ball in Dembele in the third minute. I think he [Partey] Would have been swept there. You cannot allow them to pass it forward from behind. What a start for PSG! “
After the game, Arteta admitted that his side had missed something in their first leg trag. But he refused to specify exactly what had gone wrong, and insisted that it had already been corrected.
“The first 15-20 minutes, especially that they score so early in a great combination, play when the margins are so small, the finish is incredible. And then we mainly had one problem that we corrected after 15-20 minutes,” he said.
“We have maintained that for the rest of the game, of which I think the game is turning around. If you want to win the final of the Champions League, you have to do something special and we have to do something special in Paris to be there.
“I tell you that it is just something that is very specific, but very important, especially the way we played. We have corrected it and it is not easy to correct it constantly, but we did it and we did it much better.
“And in the end we have two of our front players one V one with Donnarumma, if they scored the goal, it is different. He made the rescues as he did against Liverpool and villa and that is the difference in the Champions League, the margins are so small.
“We also had a not – -insan goal and another two big situations that took place in the game that unfortunately did not go on our way. If it is [performance] Significantly better, hopefully the result will also differ considerably. “