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ARSENAL manager Arsene Wenger was booed and jeered by Gunners fans as he boarded a train at Stoke-on-Trent station following the club’s 3-2 defeat at the Britannia Stadium on Saturday. Arsenal fell behind after only 19 seconds and were 3-0 down by half-time, and although they pulled two goals back in quick succession after the break they were unable to salvage a point.
Footage on YouTube showed Arsenal supporters booing the Frenchman, who has been manager since 1996, with one shouting at him to “f— off and leave,” while another shouted to striker Joel Campbell: “Get out while you can, Joel.”
Arsenal’s defeat brought an abrupt halt to a run of three successive wins, and defender Per Mertesacker said they had only themselves to blame.
The Germany international, a World Cup winner in the summer, said the players had shown character in the second half, but admitted that their first half display had made the situation impossible.
“We nearly came back from a shocking first half,” he told Arsenal’s official website. “We had to show some morale and some respect to our travelling fans.
“At half-time we said to ourselves: ‘We’re going to fight until the end, no matter what happens.’ That was the only positive thing. We aren’t normally like that (defensively), so it’s a big regret.
“We’ve a few problems. We’ve had a couple of games in the last two weeks so we had to shuffle around a bit and sometimes when you aren’t used to a position, you can find yourself one or two yards from the right position.
“That’s not an excuse — overall we lacked a lot of things, especially in the first half, and we tried to turn it around and keep our chins up to give ourselves a much better position.”
Midfielder Mathieu Flamini said: “We’re very upset with ourselves and very sorry for our fans, who travelled here.” — ESPN
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