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Mikel Arteta said he would concede the Premier League title to Liverpool "over my dead body" as he insisted Arsenal can still be crowned champions.

The Gunners head to Nottingham Forest on Wednesday 11 points adrift of Liverpool following the Reds' weekend victory at Manchester City, a day after Arteta's side slumped to a 1-0 loss against West Ham at the Emirates.

Following the defeat to the Hammers - after which he criticised his players for failing to reach the standards required to end the club's 21-year wait for the title - Arteta conceded the championship race was no longer in his hands.

But speaking on the eve of Arsenal's trip to third-placed Forest, the Spaniard said: "I'm not going to stop, over my dead body.

"If I think that way, I'll go home.

But if you want to win the the Premier League, you're going to have to do something special.

You're probably going to have to do something that nobody else has done in the history of the Premier League."

Arsenal's bid to win the title has been derailed by a series of injuries, with Kai Havertz and Gabriel Jesus out for the season.

Five players have been sent off in their 26 league games so far.

Arsenal’s title hopes were dealt a potentially fatal blow by West Ham (PA Wire)

The Gunners have been Liverpool's closest challengers this season, and have progressed to the last 16 of the Champions League, but Arteta believes his side could easily have been dumped out of Europe and left battling in mid-table.

He continued: "If somebody tells you at the start of the season, by this time, you have played five times with a red card over half an hour in each of those games, and you have lost this amount of players, what's the bet?

You're going to have to set a certain amount of numbers to win this league.

"And we're going to have to hit that number if we're going to have any chance of doing that.

But we're certainly going to continue to try."

PA


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