Mikel Arteta admitted his Arsenal side did not deserve to beat Fulham in the Premier League on Sunday after putting on their "worst performance of the season".
Bukayo Saka put Arsenal ahead early on but the Gunners soon collapsed and goals from Raul Jimenez and Bobby De Cordova-Reid ultimately steered Fulham to a deserved victory.
"We weren't good enough. Simple as that," Arteta told Sky Sports after the game.
"We lost the game three days ago [against West Ham], we fully deserved to win because we were so good. And today we were nowhere near the level.
"We conceded two very similar goals, we gave the ball away and then the organisation in our box and set-plays...we didn't generate enough today, our rhythm wasn't good enough in attack, and defensively we were second best in every action.
"You have to play 100 minutes in the league so it's not enough to play a few actions. It's a really sad day because today we didn't deserve to win the game.
"We never got going [after changing to 3-5-2 late on in the second half] because we gave every ball away, and we could not dominate the direct play so we didn't do any of those two and it's very difficult to generate any momentum. Credit to Fulham as well."
Arsenal were top of the Premier League at Christmas but a run of three games without a win saw them end 2023 in fourth, while the 2-0 win over Brighton & Hove Albion is the team's only victory in their last six matches across all competitions.
Arteta declined to worry about Arsenal's recent slump in form, insisting the Fulham game was the first in which the Gunners truly let themselves down.
He reflected: "We had a great performance against Liverpool. We had a great performance against West Ham and didn't win. Today was the one you have to isolate, because that was the worst performance of the season."
