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'The pressure is on us every week'

A win or draw at Sunderland on Saturday would extend our unbeaten away run in the Premier League to 10 games.

Arsene Wenger is proud of that record, but he expects it to be seriously tested this weekend.

"We have a good solidarity, we play away from home with a full desire to win the games and we’ve improved our defensive quality as well," said the boss. "But it’s in question every time - we have a tricky early game tomorrow and we have to be inspired by what we have realised until now, and continue to improve.

"The pressure is on every week on everybody. It is very tight at the top - two points difference between five teams - so every game of course becomes important.

"On the other hand, you have not to be fooled - you win the games when the performances are good, so let’s focus on what is important, which is the quality of our performance. Last week we had 75 per cent of the ball and could not score so we know we need to use the ball better, in a more efficient way."

Sunderland are bottom of the Premier League but a trip to the Stadium of Light is never easy - especially with the evergreen Jermain Defoe in the Black Cats’ attack.

"Honestly, you have to admire Defoe for what he has done," said Wenger. "You think when a guy like him at his age moves to the United States that it was the end for him in the Premier League but he came back, had a huge impact and certainly it is down to him that Sunderland stayed in the league last year.

"There must be a big passion behind that. I don’t know [Defoe] well but he is absolutely amazing.

"Their main danger is Defoe but they are good on set-pieces with Khazri, and they have Kone and O’Shea who are dangerous on set-pieces as well. They are a team who are in a bad position at the moment, but it’s early in the season. It’s very tight at the top and very tight at the bottom as well, so there are no differences anywhere."

 

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