Interview

Lichtsteiner - We were careful, but played well

Stephan Lichtsteiner had one of his best nights in an Arsenal shirt on Thursday night as we beat BATE Borisov 3-0 at Emirates Stadium.

We spoke to the Switzerland international after the match, and this is what he told us:

on the team’s performance…

We are happy that we passed through this round, so we will look forward to the next round. It was our objective to get through this round. Of course it wasn’t easy after losing the away game 1-0, so we had to be very careful that they didn’t take over. In the end it was a good performance and we’re happy that we’re into the next round.

on pushing on for more goals…

We played very well, but we have to keep working. It’s our mentality and our way.

on the goals coming from wide areas…

Yeah, of course. That was a big part of our gameplan.

on his goalline clearance…

It’s important to keep a clean sheet because if we conceded then we would have needed to score three goals, so even at 2-0 you need to be focused in the game. It was a very good game tactically, but also mentality wise.

on the importance of following this up with wins in the Premier League…

It’s a really important week for us. We play two matches (in just three days) so we need to challenge for the top four.