Aaron Ramsdale says Arsenal’s late-season collapse towards the end of last season has ignited a new ‘burning fire’ in the Gunners’ squad this term.
Crucial win
Arsenal gave their fans something to cheer on for the week after a statement 3-1 victory over local rivals Tottenham at the weekend.
Thomas Partey’s long-range strike opened the scoring but Harry Kane’s penalty tied things up at the break. Gabriel Jesus soon restored Arsenal’s lead after the interval and, after Emerson Royal was sent off, Granit Xhaka’s strike eventually secured all three points.
Arsenal ran riot over their opponents and despite claims of Emerson’s red-card giving the Gunners an advantage, it was pretty much one-way traffic for most of the game.
Both the performance and result were in stark contrast to the reverse fixture in May, which saw Tottenham win 3-0 and ultimately pip the Gunners to the final Champions League position.
Speaking after the defeat back in May, Ramsdale said Arsenal’s emotions got the better of them but thankfully a repeat was avoided in the latest derby encounter.
Ramsdale hails ‘different’ Arsenal
Speaking after the victory, Ramsdale says the disappointment from last season is acting as a source of motivation for the players in the current campaign.
“The experiences at the end last season are adding to our team spirit and mentality,” he said.
“It’s not just the lads who have come in who have brought this winning mentality. We all have this fire burning inside because of what happened at the end of last season.”
“We spoke about it before the game, to play the game and not the occasion and that’s what we did.”
“The day I returned to pre-season, two weeks late through internationals, I came back and the standard of training had increased.”
He added: “From the start of the season we played really well in games and we’re winning, that helps”.
“It is a never-say-die attitude, the way I would word it is an “Eff it mentality”, ‘who cares we have conceded? We have got 10 minutes, 70 minutes, we will play our way. We never run out of time’.”
“That is the big thing for us and the manager, we don’t stop working.”
William Saliba has also laid down an early marker as one of Arsenal’s best players of the campaign so far and Ramsdale also took time to hail the Frenchman.
“He has fit in really well,” Ramsdale said of the 21-year-old.
“It is a credit to him that he has been put straight into the team, he is a bit of a Rolls-Royce with the way he moves and he has never seemed phased.
“He is still a young boy so still makes mistakes so at the minute it is either Ben (White), myself, Gabriel or Thomas Partey digging him out and he is digging other people out as well.
“That is the main thing at the minute, our mistakes aren’t leading to too many things and that is the sign of a team with good characters in and around that back five.”
More to come
Admittedly, Arsenal are showing an uncharacteristic fighting spirit this time around and a trait like this, asides physical abilities on the pitch, could be a major factor that could see them improve on their achievements from last season.
