Arsene Wenger has challenged his players to prove they don’t have an inferiority complex against the Premier League big guns.
Since the start of the 2012-13 season, they have won just 11 of their 51 league games against the five other teams in last season’s top six — hardly a boost for Sunday’s trip to Chelsea.
‘It is important that we get a result against a top four rival, said Wenger.
He continued: ‘Nobody would deny that. If you calculate the positions in the top four then, of course, it will be decided by your results against your direct opponents. This is an acid test, of course.’
Similarly, Arsenal have lost seven of their last eight games at Stamford Bridge.
And Wenger added ‘Basically, in last few years, Chelsea has had great teams so it was always difficult to win there.
‘But our record against Chelsea has been good, we won at home last year, we won the FA Cup final, on penalties in the Community Shield, so let’s focus on the quality of our game and not too much on where we play.’
Petr Cech, Laurent Koscielny, Shkodran Mustafi, Sean Kolasinac, Granit Xhaka, Danny Welbeck and Alexandre Lacazette are expected to return to the starting XI for the clash.
There are slight injury doubts over Mesut Ozil and Aaron Ramsey, however.