Pogba takes the blame for his ‘stupid’ penalty that hands Arsenal victory over Manchester United
Manchester United midfielder Paul Pogba took the blame for Arsenal’s 1-0 Premier League loss at home by his team after giving away the second-half penalty that determined the score.
With a poorly judged challenge inside the box, which he described as ‘stupid’, he clipped the foot of Hector Bellerin, and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang converted the penalty.
Pogba said it’s a poor performance. He can’t give a foul away like this himself.
He assumed he could hit the ball, but he didn’t. With the penalty, it cost them the goal.
Pogba shouldn’t have given away such a penalty. He was a little out of breath, and that made him make this dumb mistake. He is going to learn from that, he is not the best in the box defensively, and he should work on that.
“We have to do better in the details, the squad, myself, it starts with me,” said the French World Cup champion, who, after being left out after Tottenham Hotspur’s 1-6 home loss last month, was recalled to the Premier League starting line-up.
After the excellent 5-0 victory over RB Leipzig in the Champions League, United manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was unhappy with his team’s display and did not spare Pogba from criticism.
“He needs to stay on his feet. Paul knows that giving away is a light penalty,” the Norwegian said.
We were too sloppy, too many passes went astray, and there was no rotation. Today we did too many things that can go wrong in a game. We didn’t get the answer we looked for today.
“We never perform well in the first half. The speed, the pace, the form — they were better than us, and they produced a few half-decent chances.
“In the second half, apart from the penalty, they didn’t look like they were going to score. So we played better in the second half, but we still have to come up with more power.”
