Mikel Arteta admits Arsenal ‘had to suffer’ in nervy win over Brighton

Manager Mikel Arteta claims Arsenal are in survival mode after he lost another two defenders to injury before overseeing a nervous 2-1 win against Brighton to move back to the top of the Premier League.

Jurrien Timber was ruled out of Saturday’s fixture with an injury sustained on Boxing Day, while Riccardo Calafiori was forced out of the starting line-up with a problem suffered in the warm-up.

Ben White and Cristhian Mosquera were both unavailable, too, as Declan Rice was deployed at the Emirates as an emergency right-back.

Despite their defensive woes, Arsenal appeared in cruise control after Martin Odegaard landed his first goal of the season before Georginio Rutter put through his own net.

However, Diego Gomez struck back on the 64th minute and David Raya was then needed to produce a fine save to allow Arsenal to take the win and pull two points clear of Manchester City.

It marked a third straight game where Arsenal – who have suffered a series of injuries this season – have won by a margin of just one goal and Arteta admitted: “At the moment we have survived six months. There’s another five and a half to go, so hopefully things will get better.

“What I like is that we have a lot of issues and we’re dealing with it in an incredible way. Yesterday we lost Jurrien and today we lost Calafiori in the warm-up.

Declan Rice. Right-back.