Manchester City midfielder Ilkay Gundogan admitted that Arsenal wanted to reach the FA Cup final more than Pep Guardiola's side.
Arsenal proceeded to the FA Cup final after beating City 2-0 in the last-four clash at Wembley on Saturday.
Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang scored a brace for the Gunners. He handed lead to his side with just 19 minutes on the clock.
"I think the energy we had starting the second half was exactly what we needed at the beginning of the game. Sometimes one very bad half is enough to lose the game and it looked like Arsenal wanted it more to go to the final today which was the most frustrating part," Gundogan told the club's official website.
"We had two kind of good chances in the beginning when we won the ball in front of the Arsenal goal but after that our game was sloppy and slow and there was a lack of energy," he added.
City now only have the Champions League left to play for after failing to defend their FA Cup crown, and Gundogan insists they will have to "improve quite quickly" in order to reach the next stage of the competition.
City will face Real Madrid in the second-leg match of the last-16 tie in Champions League next month.
"We have two more league games to play and then we have a big game against Madrid. We should definitely improve because the way we played today won't be enough to go into the next round of the Champions League," he said.
"We have to improve quite quickly because we don't have much time... We need to try to do our best," he added.
( With inputs from ANI )