It was a night of mixed emotions for Ainsley Maitland-Niles as he made his Premier League debut in our goalless draw at West Ham.
The England Under-21 international was thrilled to make his full debut, but frustrated not to have won the game.
This is what he said to the press afterwards:
on West Ham going close at the end…
We had a lot of possession and we should have put the game to bed early doors. It’s a lack of concentration when getting forward which nearly lost us the game.
on not winning since before United game…
It’s not a concern. The manager and the boys have a plan, so we’re just trying to get back to winning ways.
on lacking the final touch today…
We’ve had a lot of possession, it’s just that final ball. It seems like it will return, so I’m sure we’ll start scoring goals again.
on his first Premier League start…
It was the best feeling I’ve felt so far to be honest. It’s great to be out there with the lads behind me, and they keep urging me forward to try to get goals. That’s fantastic.
on the disappointment of dropping points…
Very disappointed, but words can’t describe how I feel right now. We should have won the game. We could have lost it at the last second, so there’s loads of emotions right now.
on how he felt when West Ham nearly won the game…
You think to yourself, ‘Oh no, all this hard work and we’ve given them a chance’. It was a poor bit of play from us really.
on what the team make of their form…
I guess every team has their bad days. At the moment it’s not really too bad for us, we just can’t find the end product at the other end of the field. That’ll come.
on starting a Premier League game compared to his other appearances…
I think it’s the best one of the lot. It’s the Premier League and English football. I’m an English lad and it’s great to play.
on getting a lot of the ball…
I was trying to get forward as much as possible and help the team to get a goal.
on how it has been adapting to the team and what people said to him pre-game…
Everyone just tells to do what I do in every game and training session. They say to get my head up and be myself and express myself and that’s what I tried to do today.
on playing at the Emirates at the weekend…
We’ve got our home crowd behind us and I think that could be what we’re missing in terms of getting that finishing touch on a goal.
Copyright 2024 The Arsenal Football Club Limited. Permission to use quotations from this article is granted subject to appropriate credit being given to www.arsenal.com as the source.
