Joe Willock started his third successive Europa League game as we drew 0-0 with Red Star Belgrade on Thursday night, having not represented the first-team at all before this season.
The 18 year old midfielder spoke to Arsenal Player after the game about his recent development and his aims for the season.
Here's what Joe had to say:
on a hard-fought game…
It was good, it was harder than we expected to be honest. They sat behind the ball and they defended well, it was a good game.
on sealing qualification…
To be honest, the aim was to top the group today, to take some pressure off for the next games. But we got through and that was the main aim really.
on being involved…
Playing for this club is a massive thing for me and something that I dreamt of all my life. I’m just getting more experience and game-by-game, I think I’m improving.
on his performance…
It was good, some things I thought I could have done better but overall I thought I put in a good shift for the team. I’m just disappointed about the result, I thought we should have nicked it.
on the opposition…
They were very good at defending, they shuffled across well and made it hard for us in the final third. It’s a learning curve.
on playing alongside senior pros like Francis and Jack…
They help me all the time really, they give me little pointers and I learn from them. I look at them for a bit of encouragement sometimes, it’s good and it’s helped me a lot.
on his season has been so far…
I think I’ve learnt a lot. I’m always looking to learn from the midfielders next to me like Francis and Jack and Theo ahead of me. I’m just carrying on learning from them and getting game experience. I feel like I’ve got stronger and fitter.
on young players looking forward to Europa League games…
We’re always looking forward to every game and showing what we can do. We all know we’ve got good attributes and everyone’s just encouraging each other.
on his goals for the rest of the season…
I just want to carry on doing well really and learning and getting more experience. Hopefully I’ll get a goal and carry on getting games.
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.
