Per Mertesacker says Arsenal will have only themselves to blame if, and more likely when, they draw another heavyweight opponent in the last 16 of the Champions League.
The Germany defender caught the mood of frustration at the club in the wake of the 3-3 home draw against Anderlecht on Tuesday, when he said that the team had to start defending as an 11-man unit. Arsenal were pegged back after leading 3-0 when they continued to throw players forward in search of more goals.
The result meant that they edged closer to a 15th consecutive qualification for the second stage of Europe’s elite competition – they need only one point from their final two ties against Borussia Dortmund (home) and Galatasaray (away). But it also meant that their slim hopes of overhauling Dortmund to finish on top of the group were practically extinguished.
If Arsenal do advance as runners-up, they are almost certain to get a difficult last-16 draw, as they have done in the past four seasons, when they have been eliminated by Bayern Munich twice, Milan and Barcelona, though they drew Milan in 2011-12 after finishing top of their group. This season the Madrid clubs, Munich, Bayer Leverkusen and Paris St-Germain or Barcelona potentially lie in wait.
“Winning the group will be tough now,” Mertesacker said. “It is going to be the same things as last year and the year before when we finished second and the draw gave us Munich. That is up to us. We did that. It was due to lack of defending.”
Mertesacker was at fault for Anderlecht’s 90th-minute equaliser when he allowed the substitute, Aleksandar Mitrovic, to get in front of him to head home Andy Najar’s cross from the right. But there had also been little pressure on Najar, which was an irritating theme of the 90 minutes. Anderlecht were consistently afforded the space in which to play.
Arsène Wenger, the Arsenal manager, regularly gives the impression that battening down of the hatches to preserve a lead is anathema to him. Against Anderlecht he asked his full-backs to press high, as usual, and even when the Belgian champions came back into the game, Arsenal committed plenty of men forward. It was just as worrying to see Wenger’s team failing to make many challenges.
“We have to defend better as a team,” Mertesacker said. “When we drop [back], we have to be involved, everyone has to be involved to defend. We cannot afford to have just five or six players defending or just the back four. That’s what we lacked against Anderlecht, especially in the defensive third in the last 20 minutes.
“We didn’t stop them playing. And they are good at it, as you could see. In the final third, when you don’t give them pressure, they can deliver good balls through the middle. We just left them playing so that was, in general, the problem.
“We were nearly through and then we dropped a bit. We need a bit of pressure to realise we are in a good position but we still face competition. That is something we really lacked at 3-0 up. That is something we have to get out of our minds.”
It can often seem as if Arsenal are trapped in Groundhog Day and in advance of Sunday’s Premier League visit to Swansea City there were the usual noises about wake-up calls and bouncing back.
“The team is very disappointed and it is a small setback for us,” Mertesacker said. “But we are good at bouncing back very quickly after small setbacks. This is a small one. It’s a good warning, that everyone should raise their game and give 10% more when it is really needed.”
