Laurent Koscielny says Arsenal must learn how to win games when not at their best if they are to win the Premier League title this season.
The Gunners are on a seven-game winning streak in all competitions that has seen them move level on points with Manchester City ahead of Saturday’s clash with Middlesbrough.
Their recent run has included a late win over Burnley, with Koscielny scoring a stoppage time controversial winner, and he says those are the kind of games where it is vital to take all thre points.
“If you want to be champions, you have to win the tough games,” he told Sky Sports’ Soccer Saturday.
“The most important thing is to win games when you are not playing well. We need to come out of games saying: ‘it was difficult, but we won 1-0’.
“It’s important to have this during the season whenever we have bad moments or when it’s difficult to play our football.
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“We need to stay strong like a unit, defend together and win games 1-0, that’s the most important thing.”
Koscielny also pointed to September’s 3-0 win over Chelsea as evidence that the Gunners have progressed this season after finishing as runners-up to Leicester City in 2015-16.
“We have improved with this because against Chelsea we had the ball and scored from three opportunities, while against Burnley it was more difficult because the game was more physical and it was difficult finding solutions,” he added.
“We scored in the last minute so we need to keep our philosophy, which is to play with movement and with our passing, but sometimes we have to play differently.”
One-nil to the Arsenal is a scoreline that has become synonymous with the Gunners and fans will have no complaints if a few more narrow wins brings a first title since 2004.
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