Mikel Arteta has now responded to Aston Villa striker Ollie Watkins who made a claim about the Arsenal players after Sunday’s clash.

Arsenal suffered a blow to their Premier League title hopes on Sunday as Aston Villa earned a 2-0 win at the Emirates Stadium.

The Gunners started the game well, and dominated the first half. However, Mikel Arteta’s men were unable to make a breakthrough in this period. Whilst Martin Odegaard mesmerised for Arsenal, the likes of Gabriel Jesus, Kai Havertz, and Leandro Trossard were all guilty of being wasteful in front of goal.

How Arsenal came unstuck against Aston Villa

After the break, the game completely changed. The Midlands outfit took control of the match and took the game to Arsenal. The home side could not regain their first half fluency, and the pressure building on their rearguard eventually told.

In the 84th minute, Leon Bailey took advantage of a ragged Arsenal back-line to meet a low cross as the back post and turn it into the net.

Photo by ADRIAN DENNIS/AFP via Getty Images

Just three minutes later, Unai Emery’s men doubled their advantage. As the Gunners pushed forward in search of an equaliser, they were caught on the break and Ollie Watkins raced away to dink the ball coolly over David Raya.

That was game, set, and match, and within moments the Emirates Stadium began to empty. Arsenal fans were criticised for their decision to leave early. It was, however, clear that there was to be no way back for the wasteful Gunners in this game.

Mikel Arteta responds to Ollie Watkins’ claim about Arsenal

After the match, Watkins gave his verdict on Arsenal’s display. As quoted on the BBC’s Match of the Day 2, the in-form England man said, “I felt like we grew into the game a lot…The longer Arsenal didn’t create much, we could see from their body language that they were getting tired and definitely getting frustrated and I think we used that as momentum and motivation really.”

Watkins’ words were later put to Arteta. Asked if tiredness and fatigue had played a part in his side’s defeat, as suggested by Watkins, Arteta responded: “well, that’s him saying that…no,” as quoted by the BBC Football Daily podcast.

The Spanish coach was clearly unimpressed with his team’s display on Sunday. Arteta gave a very clear message to the Arsenal players in the dressing room after this match.

He will expect his players to bounce back from this setback quickly, beginning with their trip to Germany on Wednesday night to take on Bayern Munich in the second-leg of their Champions League quarter-final clash. Progress to the semi-finals of Europe’s elite club competition would certainly provide a timely lift.