Simon Jordan leaps to Arsenal’s defence and tells fans to ‘pack it in’

Simon Jordan has defended Arsenal and their style of play, claiming rivals fans are only complaining to belittle their victory.

On Tuesday night, the Gunners secured a late 1-0 victory in Portugal against Sporting Lisbon in their first leg of the Champions League quarter-final.

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Additionally, Mikel Arteta‘s squad confirmed that the Premier League has earned a fifth qualification spot for the competition.

Kai Havertz came off the bench to score a stoppage-time winner to put the north London side up on aggregate as a second leg at the Emirates lies ahead.

Despite the German scoring the decisive goal, it was David Raya who was the hero and recieved player of the match.

The Spaniard denied the Portuguese outfit numerous times as he saved a Maximiliano Araujo shot onto the crossbar before denying Geny Catamo’s header from close range.

While the Gunners were victorious, many have pointed out that the win was secured in uninspiring fashion.

On White & Jordan on talkSPORT, ex-Crystal Palace chairman Jordan defended Arsenal‘s style of play and said: “I think it’s the players’ jobs to perform in every single game as much as they possibly can.

“What Arsenal fans would agree with is they were not helped on Saturday with the embarrassment of losing to Southampton.

“But what it does prove is that you have got to take each game in isolation, every game has its own connotation.

“The Carabao Cup final against Manchester City was a 50-50 game in which Arsenal didn’t play well in the second half and the FA Cup quarter-final was a poor performance.

“Many people I spoke to were saying a win [in the Champions League] would be a very difficult task, I thought Arsenal would get a result. I thought they would come back from the game with at least a draw.

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“They’ve gone there, they’ve done the job and all people will talk about is how they’ve played. It doesn’t matter how they’ve played.

“They’ve gone to a ground where most people can’t get anything from and they have a point in saying people need to pack it in and stop going after the way they play because I don’t know what it’s all about, it’s just a way for them to diminish Arsenal.”

This Champions League success comes after Arsenal were beaten 2-1 by Southampton, ending their hopes of a treble following their exit from the FA Cup.

Two weeks prior, Arsenal were also beaten 2-0 in the Carabao Cup final by Premier League title rivals Manchester City.

On the other hand, Sporting had won their last 17 home games in all competitions and were clearly a force to be reckoned with.

Due to inconsistent form for Arteta’s side, Gooners were fearing that their quest to win a first league title since 2004 would enter another year.

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However Jordan was quick to back the Premier League leaders and said: “We’ve seen Arsenal at their very best, and what did they win? Bugger all.

“So from an Arsenal point of view, they can hopefully get into a position where they can grind out a Premier League with a touch of flair with a touch of steel.

“Then I suspect Arsenal would have done precisely what they wanted to do.”