Arsene Wenger has admitted that Arsenal’s current situation of starting games on the back foot is “really worrying” after another abysmal first half display on Tuesday. 

The Gunners were recently criticised heavily for collapsing during the opening minutes of the clash against Bournemouth which saw them go 2-0 behind early on before having to score three times to salvage a draw.

Those woes repeated this week as goals from Younes Kaboul and Troy Deeney handed Arsenal a big deficit after only 14 minutes of action against Watford.

“It’s not only frustrating because of the other results but because we didn’t produce the performance we want to produce,” the Arsenal manager said

“When you play at the top of the league like that, that is the most disappointing. It’s really worrying the way we turned up in the first half.

“We look disjointed, not dominating the duels. We were a bit unlucky as well because we paid very heavily for it and after that we responded very well in the second half but it was not enough.

“We prepared well for the game and we told them about what to expect, but it looked like mentally we were not ready for the fight that they gave us.

“Of course we want to respond against Chelsea,” Wenger added. “When you lose a game you want to respond straight away and we have to analyse well what happened and respond straightaway on Saturday in a very convincing way.”

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