Mikel Arteta believes Champions League football would be a “game changer” for Arsenal and has not given up hope of guiding the Gunners to a top-four finish.
Arsenal have lost their last three Premier League games against Crystal Palace, Brighton and Southampton and slipped to sixth in the table.
However, they are still only three points off Tottenham in fourth and have a game in hand on their north London rivals.
Arsenal take on Chelsea on Wednesday night and a win at Stamford Bridge would spark their Champions League push back into life.
“The Champions League brings, first of all, the club much closer to where we want and to play in a competition that has a huge history in relation to our club,” said Arteta.
“Secondly, obviously it improves every situation with the sponsor, financially, expectations, the capacity to grow our players and expose them into a different dimension of a competition and this is where we want to be. It is a game changer.
“The Champions League pushes you there with the best teams in Europe and we definitely want to be there. At this club, it is only about winning and they were three very different games but with the same outcome.
“We are extremely unsatisfied with that. We know we are hurting but at the same time we know how we lost them.
“What we merit in those games, it doesn’t reflect in the amount of points that we have taken. We have to understand why that happens. But there is nothing to look back. Everything is still to play for.
“Our ambition is still intact, our desire is still intact. We know the challenge ahead and we are going to go for it.”
