Inevitably, the result at Molineux saw Arsenal labelled bottle jobs on social media and among some pundits. Club legend Paul Merson told Sky Sports: “It’s disappointing. You can’t play in second gear. When Wolves went to 2-2, there was an urgency. They didn’t have that before. You can’t play like that. Every game is a cup final to the end.
“You’ve got to play at a high tempo. If Arsenal play at a high tempo, Wolves can’t live with them. But to play the way they played, and it’s slow and lazy, and they are giving the ball away, then Wolves are always going to be in the game. It’s going come on full blast now, being bottle jobs, melting. It’s full-on now – drawing away at Brentford and then being two goals up against the worst team in the league.”
Responding to being labelled ‘bottlers’ in a press conference on Friday, Arteta said: “It’s not part of my vocabulary and I don’t see it like this because I don’t think anybody wants to do that as an intention. I wouldn’t use that word, but that’s me. That’s individual opinion, perspective. You have to respect that.
“You lose two points against Wolves in the manner that the game played out, you have to take it on the chin. What I’m very interested in is the next one, what we are made of, what we love about this and how we write our own destiny from here.”