CM Story - The Story of Josh McEwen

Nottingham Forest (3-4-3): Sels, Milenkovic, Murillo, Morato, Bakwa, Baleba, Anderson (Off 88), Hudson-Odoi (Off 79), McAtee (Off 62), Kalimuendo, Ndoye 

Subs: Malagon, Ait-Nouri (On 62), Gibbs-White (On 88), Igor Jesus, Cunha, Hutchinson (On 79), Awoniyi, Dominquez, Carmo 

Arsenal (4-3-3): Raya, Laimer, Saliba, Pienczak, Lewis-Skelly, Zubimendi, Rice, Odegaard, Saka, Gyokeres, Eze (Off 62) 

Subs: Kepa, Wijndal, Branthwaite, Bouaddi, Larsson, Nwaneri, Martinelli, Trossard (On 62), Jesus 

Q: Andoni a tough defeat against a very inform Arsenal. What are your thoughts on the match? 

Andoni Iraola “We knew it would be a tough game because Arsenal have been in very good form but we wanted to try and cause them problems. I thought the first forty minutes it was a very even game but then they got the goal and then the second half starts and the plan was to try and get at them a bit more and then a wonder goal by Odegaard finds the top corner from twenty five yards and suddenly your playing a team who don’t concede a lot of chances and you need to find two goals so its a mammoth task but we kept going but yeah at 2-0 it was very hard.” 

Q: Josh another win another clean sheet. Do you feel your proving your doubters wrong after what was written at the end of last season? 

Josh McEwen “I don’t pay attention to what gets written I knew that the club was progressing and once we had a pre season together we would be in a better position to make the start we have. We aren’t getting ahead of ourselves there’s still thirty four games to go but we are really pleased with the start we’ve made and yeah we’ll move onto the Champions League game midweek before a really tough game against Manchester City next week.”  

Arsenal (4-3-3): Raya, Kayode, Mosquera, Branthwaite, Wijndal, Bouaddi, Rice (Off 72), Larsson (Off 47), Nwaneri (Off 72), Jesus, Martinelli 

Subs: Kepa, Lewis-Skelly, Saliba, Norgaard (On 72), Odegaard (On 47), Saka, Eze, Trossard (On 72), Gyokeres 

FC Kobenhavn (4-2-3-1): Kotarski, Bulut, Pereira, Cresswell, Lopez, Lerager (Off 65), Sarapata (Off 47), Ziyech (Off 58), Robert, Mattsson (Off 47), Reese (Off 65) 

Subs: Trott, Hatzidiakos (Off 47), Elyounoussi (Off 47), Moukoko (On 65), Garananga, Madsen (On 65), Chiakha, Achouri (On 58), Meling 

Q: Josh a proud moment for Declan Rice as you named him captain of the club tonight but overshadowed by what looks like a serious injury to Hugo Larsson is there any update on him? 

Josh McEwen ”When a player has to leave on a stretcher it is never good but we will wait for a scan and then we will see what the damage is but it wasn’t a bad challenge or anything which always raises concerns when a player is in alot of pain. It was hard the next ten minutes after this because as a player they’re worried about their team mate and obviously Hugo (Larsson) has made a big impact already hopefully it isn’t his ACL and he will be back soon. I thought it was a proud moment for a few lads Michael (Kayode), Jared (Branthwaite) and Owen (Wijndal) obviously it was Hugo’s first start but it ended bad for him but we did well to focus back on the game and to take three points in a tough match.” 

Q: Jacob not the result you wanted but can you take some pride in your performance? 

Jacob Neestrup “I think we can because we caused Arsenal more problems than they have been caused this season so far. They are a great team with world class players throughout and for most of the game we were in it. We reacted well to going a goal down we forced Raya into a couple of good saves but the danger with their team is they can counter obviously Jesus has a big chance he missed but Martinelli wrapped up the game but we can take pride coming away and giving Arsenal a tough match.” 

Hugo Larsson will be out for four months after suffering medial Collateral Ligament injury the player does not require surgery but will undergo an extensive rehabilitation programme 

Arsenal (4-3-3): Raya, Laimer (Off 67), Saliba, Pienczak, Lewis-Skelly, Zubimendi, Rice, Odegaard (Off 67), Saka, Gyokeres, Eze (Off 67) 

Subs: Kepa, Wijndal, Kayode (On 67), Branthwaite, Bouaddi (On 67), Nwaneri (On 67), Martinelli, Trossard, Jesus 

Manchester City (4-3-3): Donnarumma, Kimmich, Dias, Ake (Off 58), Mendes, Rodri, Reijnders, Silva (Off 66), Foden, Haaland, Doku (Off 58) 

Subs: Oblak, Stones (On 58), Savinho (On 58), Mubama, Khusanov, Gonzalez, Dickson, Kovacic (On 66), Akanji 

Q: Josh a special hat trick by Viktor Gyokeres in a huge game. Have you shown yourselves as true title contenders? 

Josh McEwen “We believed from the first game of the season we could be title contenders, we are so happy with the quality in the team. After Hugo’s (Larsson) injury midweek I said to the lads you have to give even more today for him and you saw with his international team mate and friend Viktor (Gyokeres) scoring a hat trick. I think Viktor showed he is one of the top strikers in the world but also Martin (Zubimendi) showed he is up there with Rodri as one of the best defensive midfielders in the world he has been absolutely outstanding for us every game and I think he goes under the radar but he allows the rest of the team to really shine and I think he showed that today.” 

Q: Gregorio a really bad day at the office you didn’t really create many chances to test David Raya. What went wrong? 

Gregorio Gimenez “I actually thought we started so well the first twenty minutes we really pressed them and forced Zubimendi into a couple of mistakes but didn’t capitalise, we boxed them in a couple of times but then they scored a goal which Gigi (Donnarumma) has admitted he is disappointed to concede at his near post I mean it was a vicious strike but Gigi thinks he should be covering that. The second goal you just can’t believe your luck you challenge the initial header form the corner from the defender and it bounces down to their striker like that and the third we know we should be defending better but in the space of twenty minutes you’ve gone from being comfortable and causing issues to being out of the game. The second half we just weren’t good enough Erling (Haaland) kept pressing but it was like the rest of the team just dropped off but last season we started slow and won the league and we know there is a long way to go.” 

Arsenal (4-3-3): Kepa, Kayode (Off 72), Saliba, Branthwaite, Wijndal, Zubimendi, Rice, Odegaard, Saka, Gyokeres (Off 72), Martinelli (Off 72) 

Subs: Raya, Lewis-Skelly, Laimer (On 72), Mosquera, Bouadi, Nwaneri (On 72), Norgaard, Trossard, Jesus (On 72) 

Tottenham Hotspur (4-2-1-3): Vicario, Doue (Off 73), Romero, Danso, De Cuyper, Bentancur (Off 72), Sarr, Simons (Off 87), Kudus, Tel (Off 87), Vega (Off 72) 

Subs: Kinsky, Spence, Kulusevski (On 72), Solanke (On 87), Brown (On 73), Maddison (On 87), Richarlison, Bahoya (On 72), Vuskovic 

Q: Josh a poor result for your team sees you exit the Carabao cup against your local rivals Tottenham. What are your thoughts on that game? 

Josh McEwen “I think the scoreline flatters them but after the first half performance where we should have been two or three in front we fell apart when they equalised and stopped playing our game. We conceded two quick fire goals which really deflated us and then they've scored from a corner. It is a result that hurts because of who we were against but we have to refocus now we have a big game at weekend  

Q: Mikel a superb fight back from your team today. How pleased are you with that result? 

Mikel Arteta “I am very happy because we played a team in great form and we fought the whole game. The first half wasn’t our best performance but we kept battling and in the second half we were so dominant and deserved to progress. We had a tough start in the league and we want to fight our way back into the title race and this result will help our confidence moving forwards. We showed Arsenal are beatable and although we are nine points behind now we showed we can beat anyone on our day.” 

West Ham United (4-1-4-1): Hermansen, Walker-Peters, Todibo, Kilman, Diouf, Soucek, Luis Guilherme, Paqueta, Fernandes, Cornet (Off 68), Thiele (Off 68) 

Subs: Ferreira, Olivera, Gomes, Fullkrug (On 68), Mavropanos, Earthy, Green, Summerville (On 68), Cabral 

Arsenal (4-3-3): Raya, Kayode (Off 68), Saliba, Pienczak, Lewis-Skelly, Bouaddi (Off 68), Rice, Odegaard, Saka, Gyokeres, Eze (Off 68) 

Subs: Kepa, Branthwaite, Laimer (On 68), Mosquera, Zubimendi (On 68), Nwaneri (On 68), Norgaard, Martinelli, Jesus 

Q: Nuno a fantastic effort from your team, how much does it hurt losing the game so late? 

Nuno Espirito Santo “It hurts because we deserved a point today, we fought so hard from the start we created a couple of great chances to go ahead before they scored but against Arsenal you must take your chances. We went behind and responded well to equalise you have seen this season so many teams go behind to Arsenal and before you know it Arsenal are two or three in front we were the opposite we fought straight back and I think if we drew today nobody would say we didn’t deserve it because they struggled to create as many chances as they have so far but obviously at the end they scored and they got the win.” 

Q: Josh a late win, were you nervous heading into them last ten minutes that this could have been two points dropped? 

Josh McEwen “I always believed we could get the goal with the players we have we always have confidence in ourselves, obviously West Ham made it difficult for us but you expect that when playing away at their ground but we didn’t look as good as we have looked so far this season but the main thing is that we bounced back with a win and now our attention turns to Atletico Madrid on Tuesday night in what will be an exciting game against the European Champions. We are looking forward to the test and showing that we have improved this season against them.” 

Atletico Madrid (5-2-3): Costa, Pubill (Off 74), Gimenez (Off 83), Hancko, Lenglet, Gvardiol, Barrios, Gallagher, Kubo, Alvarez, Baena 

Subs: Musso, O’Reilly, Simeone (On 74), Vlahovic, Ruggeri, Cardoso (On 83), Martin, Almada, Leon 

Arsenal (4-3-3): Raya, Laimer, Saliba, Pienczak, Lewis-Skelly, Zubimendi (On 83), Rice, Eze (Off 74), Saka (Off 74), Gyokeres (Off 83), Nwaneri  

Subs: Kepa, Kayode, Branthwaite, Mosquera, Wijndal, Martinelli (On 74), Norgaard, Bouaddi (On 74), Jesus (On 83) 

Q: Martin not the start to the defence of the Champions League you have been looking for with a draw and now a heavy defeat at home. What are your thoughts on tonights game? 

Martin Devos “Of course the start is not ideal but this competition is not won in the second game there is a long way to go. We had a tough game with PSG in our first game and tonight against Arsenal two teams who could win this trophy with their teams. Obviously at home in two games you want more than one point but I thought tonight we had moments where if we were a little more lucky we would have actually got something from the game at 2-1 we hit post and then they score at the other end so things like this affect the result but we played a top team who played very well.” 

Q: Josh a 4-1 win against the European Champions that must feel good? 

Josh McEwen “Yeah I’m so proud of the lads tonight we came here knowing they would be physical and they were but we played with bravery and we played some fantastic football at times Ethan (Nwaneri) produced some magical moments his best performance I thought but Bukayo (Saka) another goal he is so good he has been the best player in the world since this season started the challenge now is for him to continue in this vein of form. I told him at the start of the season don’t go looking for the ball pick up the ball in the dangerous areas where we need you on the ball and look at what he is doing now, he has been unstoppable at times and we feel lucky to have him here. I also have to mention young Ayyoub (Bouaddi) coming off the bench is never easy but to come into this type of game and deliver like he did I am so proud of him.”