Arsenal captain Per Mertesacker admits that Thursday night's game against 1.FC Koln was annoying for the players because of the uncertainties surrounding the start of the match.
20,000 Koln fans descended on the streets of London despite Arsenal allocating only less than 3,000 tickets for the away end for their Europa League clash.
Large swathes of Koln fans clashed with security officials inside and outside the stadium and the match started after an hour’s delay because of the incidents outside the stadium.
Mertesacker, who played the 90 minutes in Arsenal’s 3-1 win last night, admits that it was an annoying atmosphere as the players wanted to get on with the game as soon as possible.
The Arsenal captain also revealed that the uncertainty surrounding the start of the game affected the players as they came to know at the last moment that the match would go on after an hour’s delay.
relatedNewsStory
The defender told German daily Bild: “It was hard to deal with it.
“We were there already and we learned very late that that match was delayed by an hour. It was annoying, especially because didn’t know whether we would be playing or not at the end.
“And we all wanted to play on the day.”
UEFA are expected to take action against Arsenal and Koln in the coming days following the conclusion of their investigation.
