We concluded our Champions League group stage with a battling draw away to PSV Eindhoven on Tuesday, and Mikel Arteta was delighted with how his much-changed side approached the match.
With little at stake on the night, the manager made eight changes to the side that faced Villa at the weekend, but his side were still able to round off the group stage with a point.
“With the amount of changes that we made, I think we competed well,” he said afterwards. “We lacked certain cohesion and timing in certain things, especially in the high press. They broke it and they had spaces to run but I was expecting that. The fluency wasn’t going to be all the time there but at least the body language and the intensity of the players was there at all times.
“We scored a beautiful goal, and at the end we could’ve won it with the chance of Leo and the goal again that was disallowed.”
The manager took the opportunity to give some minutes to several players who had not been as involved much this season, but he explained his decision to leave the academy players on the bench.
“When you make that many changes, on top of that to play the young kids, I don’t think it was the right thing to do, especially from the beginning.
“We had to wait to see how the game developed but it was a really intense game against a really, really good team that haven’t lost at home here in two years almost.
“I think it was a good experience, a lot of minutes for certain players. We have little niggles with some players but hopefully all good.”
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