Arsenal defender Carl Jenkinson is confident that the players at the club have enough quality to turn things around and react positively after their opening day defeat at home to Aston Villa.
The Gunners will only have three days to think about their 3-1 defeat at the Emirates Stadium as they head to Turkey to face Fenerbache in their Champions League qualifier on Wednesday night.
After the final whistle on Saturday, the home team were booed off by the fans and the majority of the ground were chanting for Wenger to spend some money, after they have gone the whole summer without spending anything.
It is a busy schedule for Wenger’s men as they have Fenerbache on Wednesday before playing Fulham on Saturday. They then play Fenerbache again the following Tuesday in the return leg before hosting Tottenham Hotspur in the league.
Despite getting off to a negative start, Jenkinson is confident that the players can bounce back and put things right.
“It could have been a completely different outcome on another day,” he told Arsenal Player. “We didn’t get the rub of the green and sometimes you don’t. That’s just how football is.
“We’re all incredibly disappointed and it’s a game that we should have and we need to be winning. We’ve got to bounce back because we’ve got a massive game in midweek.
“We want to be playing in the Champions League. It’s the pinnacle of football and it’s where this club belongs so we’ve got to get our heads straight and recover from this result. I’m confident we’ll do that because we’ve got a lot of characters in the dressing room.”
Jenkinson continued:
“It’s a marathon not a sprint. We’ve played one game and of course everyone is really disappointed,” he said. “You could hear that the fans are disappointed. They don’t want to see that at home.
“The only thing I can say is that we’re as disappointed as the fans. If you were in the dressing room after, you would have been able to tell that. Believe me, we’re going to fight to put things right.
“The season is a very long one and we’ve started poorly before and come back to have very strong seasons.
“We’ve lost one game. We shouldn’t look into things too much. There’s no denying we’re all really disappointed but as I’ve said, we’ll be battling to put things right and that starts in midweek.”
Written by Alex Batt – @AlexBatt
