Mikel Arteta has thanked Aaron Ramsdale for creating “magic moments” that could play a key role in the Premier League title race after Arsenal’s 2-2 draw against Liverpool on Sunday.
The Arsenal goalkeeper made three professional saves to deny Liverpool a late winner after Mohamed Salah and Roberto Firmino scored goals to put the Reds back in a 2-0 win.
Ramsdale turned down Darwin Nunez when he went one on one, brilliantly deflected Salah’s deflected shot around the post, and somehow thwarted Ibrahima Konata at point-blank range in the closing seconds.
Arteta compared Ramsdale’s influence to Alisson’s at Liverpool in recent years after the England international starred at Anfield, where Salah missed a penalty in the second half.
The Arsenal manager said during the post-match press conference: “You need your goalkeeper if you want to win and race for titles. How many times did Alisson do what he had to?
“You have to have it, you have to have these magical moments from the goalkeeper. Today we also had some exceptional moments from the players, and to win on such venues, you need it.”
Sum it up @AaronRamsdale98 performance in a nutshell pic.twitter.com/YrnZUBFoHR
— Arsenal (@Arsenal) April 9, 2023
The draw leaves the Gunners six points ahead of Premier League summit runners-up Manchester City, although defending champions Pep Guardiola have a game in hand.
While Ramsdale stepped up in decisive moments, the draw could be seen as a missed opportunity for Arsenal after Gabriel Martinelli and Gabriel Jesus took the visitors to the top.
Arsenal will take a short trip to West Ham London next Sunday, who will then host Southampton before traveling to City on 29 April.
Arteta admitted that Firmino, who played in the 87th minute, was frustrated, but supported his team to continue responding as they had done the entire campaign.
He added: “When you concede at the end, you always focus on dropping two points, because you have them and you suffer, but you rely on certain moments and feel: “Ah, we had to do this! »
“But to be honest, they had four big chances where they could score and (Salah) missed a penalty.
“We will have to look at ourselves in the mirror and we should have played much better in the second half.
“We are already responsible for 31 games. Every single day is a test, and now the test is how well we will play on Monday and how well we will prepare to beat West Ham and play the way we want to beat West Ham.