Former Aston Villa striker Gabby Agbonlahor has told Mikel Arteta to ‘be humble’ in a scathing rebuke of the Arsenal boss following his comments after Arsenal’s Champions League exit.
Having watched his side lose the second leg of their semi-final against Paris Saint-Germain – which completed a 3-1 aggregate win for the Parisian’s – an emotional Arteta claimed that the Gunners had ‘one per cent’ been the best side in the competition.
‘When you analyse both games, who has been the best player, the MVP, it has been the same player — the goalkeeper,’ he added post match.
The assessment drew widespread criticism from fans and pundits. PSG boss Luis Enrique, who praised the Gunners for ‘playing in a clever way’, insisted his side ‘deserved to get to the final’ across two legs.
Ex-Villa star Agbonlahor also disagreed with Arteta’s view which he labelled ‘ridiculous’ before imploring the Gunners boss to be mindful of his public comments and to be ‘humble in defeat’.
‘They tried, in the first 15 minutes they were the better team,’ he said on talkSPORT. ‘They should have scored two or three goals, it just shows you what a top goalkeeper can do in this competition.
Mikel Arteta said Arsenal had been the best side in the competition after their defeat by PSG
Arsenal went down to goals from Fabian Ruiz (middle) and Achraf Hakimi (left) on the night
Gabby Agbonlahor labelled Arteta’s comments ‘ridiculous’ before urging the Arsenal boss to be ‘humble in defeat’, with the north London club suffering another season without silverware
‘But after that, I felt Arsenal faded, Odegaard had a better game, Martinelli, but they faded second half. For the manager to say the best team lost is ridiculous and this is the reason that other fanbases don’t want Arsenal to win anything.
‘I think Arteta’s got to be careful with the way he’s speaking sometimes. He’s talking about the last two seasons, “we’ve got this amount of points and that amount of points we got would have been enough to win the league this year, Arsenal are the best team in Europe…”
‘Sometimes just be humble in defeat. The better team won over two legs, by far the better team for me. PSG are the best team in the competition, there’s no shame in saying “we fell short, we’ll come again next season”.’
Defeat in Paris means that Arsenal will suffer another season without a major silverware. Their European exploits helped to mask the disappointment of a league campaign that saw them surrender the Premier League title to Liverpool in April.
As the season has drawn to a close, the Spaniard has been keen to reference the injuries his side has suffered as to provide some mitigation for their failure to achieve their season objectives.
Following Wednesday’s bruising 2-1 defeat, he again made note of the stars he was unable to call upon in the Parc des Princes, which included the likes of Kai Havertz, Gabriel Jesus and Gabriel Magalhaes.
He added: ‘They deserve a lot of credit for what they are doing in the context of the situation and the amount of injuries, probably the worst state you could arrive here as a team.
‘To come here with a different context and still do that, it gives me a lot of positives for the future but tonight I am very upset.’
PSG, who have now dumped out three Premier League sides in the knockout phases of this competition, will face Inter Milan in the Munich final on May 31.
The Gunners, meanwhile, will begin their clash against the Reds at Anfield on Sunday by giving Arne Slot’s men a guard of honour.
