After Arsenal banged in another four goals at the weekend as we cruised past Liverpool, only Chelsea have scored more Premier League goals than the Gunners and they have only one more than our 62, and no EPL club has scored more than our 89 in all competitions.
It is not just the quantity either, because the Gunners have been scoring some beauties all season, including all four against Liverpool. If it had not been for a remarkable weekend of long range strikes from Defoe, Zamora, Rooney and Adam, you would have thought that at least one of Ozil, Bellerin, Alexis or Giroud would have been up for Goal of the week.
As reported by the Arsenal website, our manager has been speaking about the awesome and varied goal threat that the Gunners are now showing. And when you combine that with an improvement in our defending and a real team spirit that sees all the Arsenal players fighting for each other, you can understand why the Frenchman is getting excited about the direction his team is heading in.
Wenger said, “You smell that we can score goals. If you look at the number of goals we’ve scored now (62 from 31 league games), that’s quite good with seven games to go.
“We have a good mentality and good cohesion in the team. There is something happening. That shows you that they are ready to fight for each other. You can see that – you can’t cheat on that.
“That is a good basis, and defensively we are getting better. I think you also have to give credit to players who get less, such as Coquelin. In the first half he broke up many attacks in a convincing way.”
The boss was also a bit more upbeat about our chances of pulling off a remarkable comeback and chasing the leaders Chelsea down in the race for the title.
He went on, “Let’s give everything to do it and see what happens. It’s too early [to talk about finishing second] with seven games to go but we’re in a good position, with four at home and only three away.
“We’re on a good run so I would say that it will be down to how we can maintain that focus and level of urgency between now and the end of the season.
“I’m a competitor and what that means is you have to go as high and as far as you can. When you go home if somebody was better than us, then well done, but we have to have give our best until the end.”
If we do fall short it will be a bit disappointing that our season started so slowly, but will it give Wenger and the players a real belief that they can win it next time?