Dominik Szoboszlai says Liverpool have been through the hardest moment of their season and their dressing room aren’t phased by the commanding lead Arsenal have built up ahead of them. After beating Arsenal at Anfield on August 31, the Reds were five clear of the Gunners. Now, seven Premier League games later, it is Mikel Arteta’s men who are seven points ahead.
Arsenal have won five of their seven league games since then, drawing the other two while conceding just twice. The north Londoners are also six points in front of Manchester City, who Liverpool face at the Etihad this Sunday. Arsenal play in-form Sunderland on Saturday night before then, giving them the chance to further strengthen their advantage over their two main rivals.
But reigning champions Liverpool appear to have lifted themselves out of their recent slump, beating Aston Villa and Real Madrid in the last week off the back of a streak of six losses in seven games. And Szoboszlai says the plan is now to simply power through and not worry too much about Arsenal’s form.
“The season is long,” the Hungarian said before Sunday’s crunch trip to face rivals City. “If we were seven points clear at this stage nobody would be saying that we had won the league already.
“Last season when we were leading the way, we just stayed calm and kept on going because anything can happen. We just need to focus on ourselves, win our games and then let’s see what other teams are doing.
“I think the team spirit. We are a really close team. Everyone protects each other, we are there for each other. That’s been the most important thing. When everything works, everyone is happy and it’s all positive, it’s easy to stick together.
“The hardest thing is when you find yourself in a position where we were a few weeks ago. But even then we stuck together and kept on going, believing it would turn for us.”
Szoboszlai scored on Liverpool’s last trip to the Etihad and this season has been the Reds’ player of the season so far. The 25-year-old added: “That’s our goal (to reproduce that performance). Hopefully this time if I get a goal and an assist there I will get the man of the match award rather than Mo Salah!
“That’s what we’ve missed I guess. I think everybody could see against Real Madrid all of us running, fighting, being there for each other, covering each other’s back. The most important thing is to keep going like this.
“There is a long way to go. Now it’s all about the Premier League and facing Man City at the weekend. We know how good they are now. We have to focus on that.”
