UCL: Arsenal are a great team, Napoli were second best –Allegri
The coach of Napoli football club Max Allegri has described Arsenal as a great team following their 1-0 loss on Wednesday night in a Champions League game played in Naples.
Allegri’s side struggled to implement their game plan against the reigning English Premier League champions which dominated both halve of the keenly contested encounter.
After a scoreless first half, Arsenal captain Martin Odegaard put his team ahead in the game in the 77th minute via an assist provided by Belgium winger, Christopher Tzolis.
The hosts led by playmaker Kevin Debruyne struggled to get back late into the game as they piled pressure on Arsenal’s defence in search of an equaliser to no avail with the visitors eventually securing a 1-0 win after the blast of the final whistle .
While reacting to his team’s performance, Allegri admitted that Napoli were second best in the encounter which saw Mikel Merino, Noni Madueke and Piero Hincapie miss clear cut chances to increase Arsenal’s goal tally in the match played at the Diego Armando Maradona Stadium.
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“Arsenal are a great team. We needed to be patient in not conceding,” he told Sky Sport. “We raised our level. We could’ve not conceded and we could’ve scored.
“We need to analyse our mistakes. The first half we could’ve done better on a technical level.
“But Arsenal put in a great performance to be able to score. They are a great side.” Allegri noted.
In other Champions League games played on Wednesday, Barcelona defeated Feyenoord 5-1 at Camp Nou, VFB Stuttgart beat Viking by 3-1, and Liverpool managed a 2-1 victory against visitors, Atletico Madrid.
The current UCL champions, Paris Saint-Germain ran riot at home with a 6-0 thrashing of Slovan Bratislava, while Galatasaray lost 3-1 away to Sporting Lisbon.
