Arsenal midfielder Mesut Ozil has urged his team-mates not to give up on the Premier League title challenge and fight for every point in the remaining fixtures, as quoted by Arsenal’s official website.
The Gunners started the calendar year on a high at the pinnacle of the League table, but have since endured a forgettable spell and are now 11 points behind League leaders Leicester with a game in hand.
It has been a disastrous past week for Wenger and his players as they have been knocked out FA Cup and Champions League in a span of four days. Ozil has now asked his team to fight and give everything they have in the remaining games this season. Speaking to Arsenal Player, he said:
Last year we won those last eight [remaining] games but we don’t care about that now. It’s important what happens now.
We have to concentrate now and give everything on the pitch. We have to fight.
I know the teams playing us will fight to take the points against us, so the games will be tough. We have to fight on the pitch and we have to think from game to game, not that we can win eight games in a row and take the points.
The German international who has been a stand-out player for the North London club bagging 18 assists this season, feels the Gunners still have a good chance of bagging the title if they win their remaining games. He added:
Now it’s not possible to win just our games [and that to be enough] so other teams need to lose points as well. The first step is to believe in us.
We have to work harder than before. We have tough games coming but we have to take the points. If we win the title, we will be very happy because we believe in us.
If you see the whole season, we’ve played very well. We’ve lost some points because we weren’t concentrated or we didn’t score. Now we have to fight for each game to take the points.
It has been tough past few months and by that I mean really tough but the season is not over yet. It is definitely out of our hands however, that doesn’t mean it’s impossible. We still have 9 games to go with eight of them being very much winnable which gives a good chance.
I am not suggesting that Arsenal will suddenly start playing breathtaking football and go on an unbeaten run. It’s wrong to expect that, but they can build game by game and once they have 2-3 in the bag then momentum can really kick in taking us over the line. See Leicester City’s recent results and you will find that they have hardly beaten their opponents by huge margins, all they did was take it game by game.
Arsenal are not new to this kind of situations as they have here over the past few years albeit that they were fighting for Champions League places then. We only need one sparkling performance which will lift the fans along with the players themselves, then the pressure will be back on Leicester and Spurs and let’s see what happens from there.
There has been a lot of negativity around the club but the fans should realise that we are down but not out, so get behind the team and we can talk all the other things in the summer. COYG!
