Flamini: Arsenal need focus for festive fixtures

The Gunners go into the fixture-heavy Christmas period five points clear of Liverpool, but the French midfielder has warned against complacency after Sunday's draw with Everton

Mathieu Flamini has called on his Arsenal team-mates to keep their focus over the busy festive period in a bid to preserve their place at the top of the Premier League table.

The Gunners are five points clear following Sunday's 1-1 draw with Everton, though face a challenging set of fixtures with trips to Napoli and Manchester City before they host Chelsea.

With Arsene Wenger's men tackling nine games over the next four weeks, Flamini knows that this period could determine the destination of the title and is keen for Arsenal to retain their consistency.

"It is a great feeling [to be five points clear], but the championship is long and we still have a lot of teams to play," the French midfielder told reporters.

"Now it is important just to focus on game after game, because we have another big match away to Napoli, and then play at Manchester City, so everything goes very quick in the championship, especially when you have so many games.

"It is going to be a busy period for us and we just have to focus.

"What would be good for us will be three victories, but we know it is not going to be easy because we will be playing three big teams with a lot of quality.

"This busy period is also going to be important for the players, that we can recover as soon as possible because we play already on Wednesday, but it will be interesting to see what happens after these three
games.

"These are all big games, the ones you want to play in, and everyone is excited to be playing in them. It will be an interesting period for everyone and hopefully a good one for us."