Aaron Ramsdale has insisted Arsenal will not give up on fighting for the title until the bitter end.
The Gunners keeper admitted Manchester City are the “benchmark” for every other team but still expressed his disappointment that Arsenal did not compete enough at the Etihad. City’s thumping 4-1 win over Arsenal has put the title firmly back in Pep Guardiola’s hands and they are on course for their fifth title in six years.
But Ramsdale said: “We’re going to be disappointed now but we haven’t played nine months of Premier League football and played the way we wanted to play to give up with five games to go.
“If anything is going to happen in football it is going to be this league it is going to happen in. It might not do but stranger things have happened in the Premier League.
“You see how tight it is at the bottom, you see how tight it is at the top so we are going to be pushing every game - with five games left and we need to win five games - and we will see how that ends at the end of the season."
“We can’t feel sorry for ourselves," he continued. "We’ll get over it and the manager will do what the manager does and dissect it and tell us and we will do everything we can. City are the benchmark and have been one of the best teams in the league for the past five years. They could potentially do a Treble.
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“They are in the Champions League quarters, semis, final most seasons and they are pushing for the Premier League so we want to get to the same sort of level as Man City doing it our own way and be competing for all competitions like they are.
“I know from a personal point of view I prefer to have points on the board than to be chasing but we will go into those games trying to win all five and we’ll see where that leads us. You never know what can happen.”
Ramsdale was damning about Arsenal’s performance at City as he admitted they made it easy for the reigning champions and did not reach their own standards.
He added: “Disappointment is the key word. When you give arguably one of the best teams in the world at the minute a bit of a leg-up in the game and are 2-0 down at half time it is a tough task to overcome.
“We know we are better than that but also this is where we want to be and the team we want to be like and be competing with.
“It’s the first time I’ve played here as an Arsenal player and just for the first 45 minutes we were a yard off the pace in pressing, in battles in giving them chances. If you want to come here and get anything you need to be on it in everything and for 45 minutes we were just a bit off.”
