Theo Walcott believes Arsenal’s sensational 5-3 victory at Chelsea proves the Gunners are back to their best and capable of beating any team in Europe.
Arsene Wenger’s side were widely written off after the pre-season departures of Cesc Fabregas and Samir Nasri triggered the club’s worst start to a season for 58 years.
A humiliating 8-2 loss at Manchester United left Arsenal in crisis, but Wenger has managed to revive his beleaguered squad and the north London team are now just three points off the top four following their demolition of Chelsea.
With games against West Brom, Fulham, Norwich and Wigan ahead it looks likely Arsenal will improve on their current run of eight wins from nine matches and Walcott is confident his team can live with any opponent at the moment.
“We are not looking too far ahead. We don’t want to say where we’re going to finish at the end of the season, but the way we’re playing at this moment in time we believe we can beat anyone,” Walcott said.
“We’re enjoying our football, our run is great now and we’re just going to keep on continuing that. Everyone is buzzing at the moment. We were disappointed to go 2-1 down just before half-time as before that we were playing some great football.
“It seemed that every time we went forward it looked like we were going to score and it could have been 8-7. It was just one of those crazy games that I’ll never forget.”
After seeing Nasri and Fabregas depart, Wenger was accused of panic buys when he brought in Mikel Arteta, Andre Santos, Per Mertesacker and Park Chu-Young just before the transfer window closed.
But England winger Walcott thinks the new arrivals have started to settle in properly, helping the club climb the table.
“We have got some absolute characters in that dressing room and Andre Santos was absolutely brilliant. He looks like he has been in the Premier League for many years,” Walcott said.
“We have the right balance between youth and experience now and we’ve got a lot of players coming back from injury too.”
Walcott also paid tribute to Robin Van Persie, whose hat-trick took his Arsenal goal tally to 12 this season.
“Robin’s form is fantastic. It makes our job much easier when he plays like that,” Walcott said.
“I have been playing alongside him for many years. It’s nice to see a fit Robin. He is enjoying playing his football, he is enjoying scoring, he is enjoying getting other people involved.”