It was a disappointing and demoralising night for Arsenal on Monday. The Gunners went down to a 2-0 defeat away at Newcastle United, all but ending their Champions League hopes.
Arsenal were poor from the outset and manager Mikel Arteta admitted afterwards that Newcastle deserved the win in a dejected-looking interview with Sky Sports. But Arteta was not the only one to face up to the cameras.
Granit Xhaka also had his say on the match and did not hold back when it came to calling out his teammates over their performances. he even suggested their display was not worthy of the Europa League, let alone the Champions League.
READ MORE: Arsenal player ratings vs Newcastle as Aaron Ramsdale and Nuno Tavares are poor but Xhaka good
Here's every word he said to the Sky Sports cameras...
Is that just devastating?
"It's so difficult to find the right words after the game. We came here to show a different game, but from the first minute to the 90th minute we didn't deserve to be on the pitch today."
Why such a below-par performance when it matters so much?
"I don’t know, I can’t explain to you why. We didn’t do what the game plan was, not listening to the coach, doing our own things and when you do your own things this is what happens. It was a disastrous performance and like this, you don’t deserve to play Champions League, we didn't deserve to play even Europa League and it’s very hard to take it at the moment. I don’t know why we are doing what the coach is asking for us."
Was it the performance of a young team feeling the pressure?
"I don’t know, if your minds not ready for this match, stay at home. Simple as it, no? Doesn’t matter about age, you can be 35, 10, you can be 18 if you’re not ready for that - nervous - stay on the bench, stay at home, don’t come here. We need people who have the balls, sorry to say that, we’re here to play because we knew this game was one of the most important for us. When you perform like this it is not accepted (sic). Very, very sad for us, very, very disappointing for us, I feel very, very sorry for the people who came here to support us, feel very, very sorry for the Arsenal supporters. This is not the way we wanted to go, this is the only thing I can say and sorry to them, I don’t have any other words."
