Jonas Eidevall: Arsenal manager expresses pride on historic night for women’s game, despite Champions League exit

Jonas Eidevall says his bruised Arsenal side are “allowed to hurt and feel empty” after succumbing to two-time European champions Wolfsburg in the cruelest fashion on Monday evening, exiting the Champions League after reaching a first semi-final since 2013.

Arsenal remain the only English side to have won the women’s European title and it took until the second half of extra-time in front of a sold-out crowd of 60,063 at the Emirates for Pauline Bremer to book a meeting with Barcelona in the Eindhoven final on June 3.

“We made it to the Champions League semi-final and lost by the tiniest of margins,” the Gunners boss said. “With all the injuries we have, with all the challenges we have, I am incredibly proud.

“[We’re hurting] quite a bit It’s tough. No doubt about it, because it was a game of such fine margins and they’re not on our side [on Monday].

“So I think we’re allowed to hurt, we’re allowed to feel empty, but we’re also allowed to feel proud of our performance and for the occasion with the supporters that are magnificent, so there’s a lot of emotions.

“We are in a tough situation on the remainder of the season both to get our feet and heads back from here, but already on Friday we have a really important [WSL] game against Leicester.”

Eidevall also explained how he and his coaching staff had been “inspired” by Arsenal’s men’s side of late, in terms of the way they have galvanised and reinvigorated Emirates Stadium crowds across this season.

“We have been speaking about that the whole season, to get used to playing for the Emirates, to use our supporters’ energy as something to have a force,” Eidevall added.

“I think the work that I’ve seen that our men’s team and Mikel (Arteta) has been doing has been so inspiring in that, with how they have been together with supporters. I think we also learned from that and we saw that [on Monday] as well.”

Speaking about the crucial mistake from defender Lotte Wubben-Moy that led to Wolfsburg’s winner, the Swede said: “I’ve told her to keep her head high, there’s no need to apologise. Mistakes happen in football. We win as a team, we lose as a team. We’re there for each other through success and failure.

“We learn. It’s inevitable sometimes. They also made mistakes and we were close to profiting from them. So it’s part of the game. She was absolutely fantastic if you look at it as a total performance.”

What’s next?

Tuesday 2nd May 6:30pm


Kick off 8:00pm

Arsenal are next in action on Friday May 5 when they return to WSL action against Leicester City, live on Sky Sports, kick-off 7.30pm.