London: Sixth-placed Arsenal can still finish in the Premier League’s top three, manager Arsene Wenger said on Friday, provided they win their remaining game starting with Sunday’s North London derby at Tottenham Hotspur.
And with second-placed Spurs also chasing victory at White Hart Lane as they look to stay in touch with Chelsea, four points clear at the top of the table, few would bet on the match ending in a draw.
“I expect an open match, (a) committed match,” Wenger told a news conference.
“A match with high pace but there could be goals in there because both teams play positive football and try to go forward and to play in offensive ways.”
Mauricio Pochettino’s Spurs hold the best home record in the league this season, with 15 victories in 17 games. Striker Harry Kane scored in the second half equalizer to rescue a point in the reverse fixture at Arsenal last November.
Arsenal trail third-placed Liverpool by six points with two games in hand and are also behind both Manchester clubs, but Wenger believes his team could leapfrog all three.
“I don’t think that the top three is decided,” said the Arsenal manager, who will be taking charge of his 50th North London encounter. “We have an opportunity to be in there if we win our games so we do not have to speculate on who is in and not in.”
“The simple thing about being in our position is we don’t need to calculate, we just need to give everything and win our games.”
Wenger is hopeful defender Laurent Koscielny could recover from a knee injury in time for the derby clash, but he ruled out the other half of his central defensive pairing, Shkodran Mustafi, for two weeks with a thigh problem. — Reuters
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