Mikel Arteta has reminded his Arsenal side that the title race is a marathon and not a sprint after falling behind Manchester City.
Pep Guardiola’s side went top of the Premier League table last week after the rest of the top four, including Arsenal, all dropped points.
Arteta has told his squad not to panic, though, and revealed that he believes it will take 96 to 100 points to win the title this season.
Arsenal are back in action on Saturday when they host struggling Burnley and a win would put them level on points with City, who face Chelsea the following day.
“We cannot be looking at other teams when we have played 11 games,” said Arteta.
“This a long marathon and things are going to change and momentum is going to shift. But in this league, you’re going to need 96 to 100 points to win it.
"When you’re going to get them is a different story, but this is the target.
“In order to do that we’re going to have to play so well and win a lot of matches, more matches than this club has ever won before.”
Arteta said last week that he thinks this year’s title race could be unprecedented, with so many teams fighting at the top of the table.
Seven points currently separates first from sixth and part of Arteta’s anger at losing at Newcastle last week is because every point counts.
“You drop one and the other team wins three,” he said. “It’s a big difference.
“That’s why those matches are so important and at the end can have such a big influence on the course of the season.”
Arsenal are huge favourites against Burnley this weekend as Vincent Kompany’s side have won just one league game all season.
"We’re going to have to play so well and win a lot of matches, more matches than this club has ever won before"
“We know that we have to win it,” said Arteta. “But you cannot focus on the outcome, you have to focus on the process and how we‘re going to prepare to give our best and deserve to win the game. Then the result will take care of itself.”
Arteta knows Kompany well from their time together at Manchester City. Kompany was captain there and Arteta was an assistant coach.
The pair spoke about Kompany moving into coaching back then and Arteta says they were both inspired by Guardiola.
“I think there will be many, many more [players who played under Guardiola going into coaching],” said Arteta.
“It has been in different countries and the saga is going to be even bigger because he (Guardiola) has this quality, this capacity to inject with you this passion and another way to look at the game. It’s very contagious, very powerful.”
