It was painful – Arteta on Arsenal’s 3-2 loss to Villarreal

Arsenal manager, Mikel Arteta, has admitted their 3–2 defeat to Villarreal was “painful.”

The Gunners lost in front of their supporters in the Emirates Cup game on Wednesday evening.

Nicolas Pepe opened the scoring against his former side before Karl Etta Eyong doubled Villarreal’s lead.

The hosts pulled one back after Christian Norgaard headed in Gabriel Martinelli’s corner-kick.

Arnaut Danjuma raced through to restore the Yellow Submarines’ lead, before Martin Odegaard converted a penalty after Max Dowman was fouled.

“Today, I think the result is painful,” Arteta said afterwards.

“I think they’ve been super-efficient but we’ve been naïve, especially the way we have defended open spaces and that’s something that, especially the way we play, we have to absolutely nail.

“Today we haven’t been good at all in that department and that has cost us the game, for sure.”