Granit Xhaka has told his Arsenal teammates that they must stick together, as critics circle after successive Premier League defeats.
The Gunners came in for heavy flak following their 2-0 loss to Brentford and they failed to show an appropriate reaction on Sunday, losing by the same scoreline to Chelsea.
It means Arsenal have lost their opening pair of games for the first time in the 118 years they have spent in the top-four tiers of English football.
Speaking before the Chelsea loss, Mikel Arteta spoke passionately about those trying to bury his team with negativity and claimed there is still optimism within his squad.
He said: "I just want people that are constructive around me. I know that people have the intention to bury us and try to criticise us, but we are not interested in that.
“We have a lot of positivity and a lot of energy, new energy that is coming up.
"In moments when there are people and there is certain negativity around the place, you need your fans and your supporters more than ever.”
Xhaka has claimed that outside voices are trying to “kill” the positivity around the club and called for a united front ahead of next week’s clash with Manchester City.
“A lot of people try to speak and to kill a little bit the players and the team,” he told the club’s official site . “But the strongest thing to do at the moment is to be together, and only together will we be stronger and give the results on the pitch after.
"We want to achieve something big, of course. After two games a lot of people are speaking about this team and about this club but I will say no season finishes after two or three games.
“We still have games still in front of us, we know we have to improve a lot of things and I'm sure we will do that.”
Arsenal find themselves in the bottom three at this early stage of the season, but the Swiss international - who has signed a new deal with the club - is confident that they will come out the other side as a better side.
“I don't think the season is over after two games. We know we lost the two games and we are very disappointed, but we still have many, many, many games to go.
“A season never ends after two, three or four games. We know we have to do better things, but this will come soon, and as I say, we have to believe in each other so we can come out from this.”
