With Arsenal kicking off to a great start of the season and Arsene Wenger nearing his 21st anniversary at the club, the French coach has conceded that he ‘made a mistake’.
Key players such as Alexis Sanchez or Mesut Ozil are yet to pen extensions to their deals at the Emirates, but Wenger admitted that the uncertainty surrounding his own situation at the end of last season may have had a negative impact on the team.
‘It’s down to us to put a positive atmosphere around the team’, the Arsenal boss said after lifting the Community Shield, ‘A lot was created by my own situation. Maybe I made a mistake’.
The 67-year-old waited until the end of May to announce his new two-year deal, as the Gunners finished fifth in the league and failed to qualify for the Champions League for the first time since Wenger took over.
The French manager urged his team to continue their good form going into the Premier League campaign: ‘Overall I believe that it’s down to us. The trend has always to come from the team. We had some bad starts recently, the last four years, in the first game of the Premier League’, he said.
‘But we had the intensity in the games in our preparation that is needed to be ready’, the Frenchman concluded.
