Arteta rues dropped points

Arsenal midfielder Mikel Arteta says he regards his club’s 0-0 draw against Stoke City as two points dropped.

The Spanish international expressed disappointment with the result but did praise the club’s defensive organisation as they kept their second consecutive clean sheet.

Arsene Wenger’s team have failed to find the target in those two matches, however, and Arteta acknowledged that stalemates were not good enough for a side with aspirations of challenging for the title.

“We are making chances, and the team looks very organised, but for me, we lost two points today,” Arteta told Sky Sports.

“You know that if you concede fouls or throw-ins, you’re in trouble, because they’re going to put the ball in the box and they’re really organised from set pieces.

“I don’t think we conceded many chances today, and we looked organised, but that’s not good enough for us.”

Arteta was adamant, however, that new signings Lukas Podolski and Oliver Giroud will start firing in the goals sooner rather than later.

“I think as soon as we’ve played three, four, five games together, we will feel more fluent,” he said. “They’ve got ability, quality, and they can score goals – we don’t have any doubts about that.

“We need to get three points every game if we want to win the league, that’s what we’re here for and at the moment we’re not doing it.

“But I think we can take some positives, and we can build on these results.”