The Gunners are six points behind leaders Liverpool after they were held to a 1-1 draw at Fulham on Sunday (08.12.24) but Arteta has challenged his team to put the disappointment of losing more ground, particularly after a late winner was ruled out for offside, behind them.

The Arsenal coach said: "I am gutted that we didn’t win it because we deserved to win from the beginning to the end.

"We did almost everything that we had to do to win it, and, but for millimetres we could have been sitting here with three points after a really strong and dominant performance against a really good team.

"You cannot cry about it, and that’s the beauty of this league, too.

"We cannot feel sorry for ourselves. We have to stand up for ourselves, and now we have to continue to improve and look at what we can do better so that the opposition have zero chances to win the game. That’s the objective."

Arsenal once again scored from a set-piece but Arteta knows that his team have to be effective in other areas if they are to win the title.

He said: "It’s a great thing that we can again score from a set-piece. It’s never enough if you don’t score three, four or five.

"If we want to improve we have to be better in every action that we do. If they play 11 direct balls, I want to win 11. If they play the high-press six times, I want to play six times. We want to manage the game 100 per cent."