Unai Emery calls on Arsenal to improve defensively after West Ham ‘cause problems’

Up and running | Arsenal picked up their first win under Unai Emery
REUTERS

Unai Emery conceded his Arsenal side must improve defensively after they escaped a first half barrage from West Ham having conceded just one on Saturday.

With more composure in front of goal the Hammers could well have scored three of four before half time with Michail Antonio, Robert Snodgrass and Felipe Anderson all passing up clear chances before the break.

Injuries to Antonio and Arnautovic hampered Manuel Pellegrini’s side in the second half and, thanks to an own goal and a late Danny Welbeck strike as the Hammers were pushing for an equaliser, Arsenal came out on top to pick up their first points of the season.

Emery, at least, appreciates that things must improve at the back.

"We are happy with the first three points, that was the first objective,” the Spaniard said.

“After the first two results we needed this today, it was important to show our supporters a match with three points.

In Pictures | Arsenal v West Ham | 25/08/2018

1/37

"It's clear we need to improve, we will continue working on not conceding as many chances to the opposition.

"They are a good team, a good coach, good players, they caused us problems in the defence. If we defend with more people in the moment we lose an attacking threat. We need to find the balance."

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in