Arsenal rally round fighting talk

Arsenal players claim their loss of form, which has seen Chelsea take a five-point lead at the top of the English Premiership, can be explained by their failure to give 100 per cent and the fact Thierry Henry (pictured) and Patrick Vieira are carrying injuries.

Arsenal players claim their loss of form, which has seen Chelsea take a five-point lead at the top of the English Premiership, can be explained by their failure to give 100 per cent and the fact Thierry Henry and Patrick Vieira are carrying injuries.

Sweden midfielder Freddie Ljungberg says the players are not giving enough commitment in tackles and the point was never more clear than in Sunday's 2-1 defeat at Liverpool.

"Liverpool wanted to have a fight and it was a fight, a real battle. We had to speak about it at half-time," he said Tuesday.

"Some of us were saying that we weren't going into the battles 100 per cent and that we lost most of them because of that. When you want to play the ball on the floor, and we do, we need to win the fight to get the ball."

But Henry denied Arsenal were finished and shrugged off media claims the team had lost its fighting spirit.

"The thing people don't realise is that Patrick has been playing for a long time with an ankle injury, certainly the last four or five games.

"The guy is putting his body on the line.

"And I've been playing since the beginning of the season with an Achilles problem. But Patrick and I don't jump off the boat - we stand and fight.

"As long as I can walk I will play if the team needs me," he said.

His 14 goals and nine assists prove he is still producing the goods for the Gunners.

And he points to Chelsea being able to rest players because they have such a big squad.

"They have lots of players to turn to. But if you look at our team sheet all the time nearly the same team is playing for us.

"We're only human beings and sometimes we're going to struggle."

He acknowledges Arsenal have some exciting young players coming through but injuries to senior players, like Brazilian duo Edu and Gilberto, have left them short on experience.

But he says November is traditionally a tough month for Arsenal.

"We always have a bad November. If the league was only in November, we'd probably get relegated."

And he added: "This won't be the last time we go through a bad patch as a team. The test is to get out of it."

The fightback starts on December 12 when they face Chelsea - just five days after their must-win Champions League clash with Norwegian side Rosenborg.

"We'll have to do it the hard way," said Henry.

Chelsea, who have already qualified for the knock-out stage of the Champions League, can afford to rest players for their last group game away to Porto on the same day a full Arsenal team will be needed to beat Rosenborg.