Premier League Boss: I Sympathised With Arsenal Last Season

Roy Hodgson felt sorry for how our season ended last term…

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Crystal Palace boss Roy Hodgson admitted that he sympathised with Mikel Arteta last season after our title chase came crashing down in the finals weeks of the campaign, the Metro reports.

We broke the record for the duration we topped the Premier League without lifting the title in May, with Pep Guardiola’s men pipping us in the end.

It has led to many wild statements about the team’s ability and our manager’s capabilities at the top level, but Hodgson came to a different conclusion.

The experienced England boss spoke of his admiration of the work Arteta has done during his Arsenal tenure, and offered an interesting take on last season’s race.

“I have great admiration for the job he’s done at Arsenal,’ Hodgson said of the 41-year-old.

“That’s a big club and he’s come in and done a really big job. I thought last season they were outstanding in every respect.

“I have a lot of sympathy, to get that close and do so well and be overtaken by the machine really that to some extent is Manchester City, who are also a wonderful football team. It must have been a gut-wrenching occasion, but they’ve come back strongly from that and started this season strongly,” he added.

A trip to Selhurst Park is never an easy one, especially for Arteta who’s had some mixed results there in the last three seasons. It will be imperative to continue the momentum we’ve started in the new season, even if we’re not necessarily playing our best football.

If last season taught us anything, it’s that peaking in April is the key – not September.