Arsenal pay heavy price for lack of ruthlessness

PARIS - On the eve of Arsenals Champions League semi-final second leg against Paris St Germain, manager Mikel Arteta said his players needed to be in the right place at the right moments to have a chance of reaching the final in Munich.

Unfortunately for Arsenal, despite 20 attempts at goal, they paid the price for failing to make those moments count as they lost 2-1 in the Parc des Princes to bow out 3-1 on aggregate on Wednesday.

Just as when losing the first leg 1-0 at home in north London last week, Arsenal were undermined by a lack of ruthlessness in front of goal as well as the brilliance of PSGs Italian goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma.

I think we were very close, much closer than our results showed, a drained-looking Arteta told TNT Sports.

What weve done today, the way we started, how we handled the pressure, the amount of pressure after 20 minutes, it should be 3-0, but there is something extra that you need in the competition to go your way. And it didnt.

Arsenal needed a fast start and they caught PSG cold in the opening 15 minutes with Declan Rice heading wide of an open goal and Donnarumma blocking a close-range effort by Gabriel Martinelli before making a stupendous low save to keep out Martin Odegaards fizzing shot.

PSG rode their luck and then made Arsenal pay in ruthless fashion with sublime goals by Fabian Ruiz and Achraf Hakimi putting the French champions in total command.

Even then, it felt as though Arsenal were not out of the tie and when Bukayo Saka did finally beat Donnarumma in the 76th there were jitters in the French ranks but Saka then wasted a glorious chance to set up a grandstand finish.

After outplaying Real Madrid at