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'We didn't have the right urgency'

What were the reasons for our 2-0 EFL Cup quarter-final defeat by Southampton?

Arsène Wenger faced the media after the game and discussed the result, his team's lack of urgency and his team selection.

on the performance…
We had a disappointing performance, especially in the first half. We gave ourselves a mountain to climb. We were not good enough defensively and gave cheap goals away in the first half. In the second half it was better but it was one of these nights where we looked like we could play for two hours without scoring a goal. We didn't have enough urgency in the first half, we were weak in some departments and we paid for that.

on his frustration at the result…
We were not incisive enough in the first half, especially. In the second half they played very deep and were sharper than us. With a two-goal advantage, everybody defended very well. If you give a handicap of two goals in the first half against a Premier League team, it’s difficult.

on his team selection…
I have regrets on having lost the game. I think we have played well until now and when you look at the players who have played tonight, some of the players who didn't play tonight were on the edge. When you look at the team we played, in midfield we had Coquelin, Ramsey, Elneny, afterwards Xhaka. Up front we had Lucas, Giroud was injured. We had Iwobi, who is a regular player in the first team. I don’t think the problem was there - we had players who are used to top-level competition but I think we maybe didn’t have the right urgency from the start on.

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