Mikel Arteta offered his congratulations to Manchester City on winning the Premier League while he reflected on what a “really sad day” it had been for the Gunners after a 1-0 defeat at Nottingham Forest cost them a first title in nearly 20 years.
Pep Guardiola and his valiant gladiators were once again confirmed as the rightful champions after Taiwo Awoniyi’s first-half goal saw Forest earn the three points to secure for themselves their top-flight status.
It was doubtless a most bitter pill for Arteta to swallow considering how his side had led the league table for the majority of the campaign, with no less than 248 days perched at the summit.
The painful reality of the situation was that an eight-point gap had actually separated Arsenal and City in March, but the Gunners’ alarming slide, aided and abetted by a sudden late season surge by City, saw the North London club shoved out of the title race as the defending champions deservedly claimed a third consecutive title, and their fifth, in six seasons.
“Really sad day, a lot of difficult emotions, we lost the game, we lost the championship after 10 and a half months fighting for it and nine and a half months almost on top of it,” he said.
“We built a lot of illusion and belief that we could go all the way and win it and in the end we fell short. Congratulations to Man City, they are the champions, they deserve to be the champions, they have done it for 38 games, we haven’t been able to do that.
“That is it and from my side I apologise because we have built that belief that we could do it and in the end the team wasn’t able to do it and that is my responsibility.
“Today is just a lot of sadness. You see a lot of people, they put everything, they put so much work, so much belief and so much hours and I am sad, I am sad for them because we wanted to find a way and squeeze everything we had in that group.
“We fell short and this is my job and my responsibility, I have to analyse that and think.
“Today we should have played much better, we gave them a goal and gave them another chance to score another goal if they wanted and we fell short to break them down.
“You need, when you come to April and May, 24 players there and available, fit and playing at their best, full of confidence and ready to go and for many reasons we haven’t had that.
“There are key moments in the league that define, the momentum goes there, the result goes there and we didn’t have those margins going on our side.”