Mikel Arteta has insisted that he did not tell his Arsenal players to be cautious in their Champions League defeat at Porto.

The Gunners failed to fire off a shot on target on Wednesday night as they succumbed to a late Galeno strike in the first leg of their last-16 tie.

That led to suggestions that Arsenal attempted to dig in and grind out a result ahead of the Champions League return game in north London, rather than maintain the attacking mantra that saw them score 21 goals in their previous five games.

However, Arteta made clear in a post-match interview that the failure to test Porto’s goalkeeper was far from intentional.

“No no no,” he responded when asked by Peter Schmeichel on CBS Sports if the Gunners were sent out to be cautious in Portugal.

“The tactic was to be much more aggressive and go for them from the beginning.

“[Porto] defended really well, especially in space in the first half. The second half, we opened them up much better but in the first half we really lacked purpose to create more issues for them.”

Arsenal boss Arteta also highlighted the need for his team to learn how to play away from home in Europe, with their recent record in knockout competitions far from impressive.

In particular, he outlined the number of cheap free-kicks his players gave away - with Arsenal conceding 22 fouls to Porto’s 14.

“Credit to them, they defended well,” he told a later press conference.

“But it’s true that when we got into certain situations, we didn’t finish the action or put the right final ball in the cross or from set-pieces as well.

“Every time we were touching somebody, it seemed to be a foul before we even kicked the ball. So, we will learn from that and be better.”