Catching Tottenham in the League 'A Big Motivation' for Arsenal, Says Unai Emery

Arsenal head coach Unai Emery has said catching Tottenham Hotspur in the Premier League table is "a big motivation" for the Gunners ahead of the north London derby on Saturday. 

The gap between the two sides is down to just four points and will be cut to one if Arsenal win at Wembley Stadium:

Spurs' Premier League title ambitions have been shattered recently by back-to-back defeats to Burnley and Chelsea.

If they lose to the Gunners, Mauricio Pochettino's side will all of a sudden be drawn into the battle for the top four with Arsenal, Manchester United and Chelsea.

And Emery's side are on the up after three wins on the bounce, most recently Wednesday's 5-1 thrashing of Bournemouth at the Emirates Stadium.

Emery said after the Cherries clash that closing the gap to Tottenham will spur on Arsenal, per Mark Mann-Bryans of the Press Association (h/t MailOnline):

"It is a big motivation. We need to take the opportunity like today, these three points. After we can have and get an opportunity like Saturday. It's one team that, at the moment, are better than us in the table. I think it is very difficult there, to win, but it is a good test, a great test and a positive test.

"It was a good performance (against Bournemouth) and we can be proud of every player. Here at the Emirates we were speaking about the fact we have a lot of matches to show the fans a complete match with one good result with the three points but with some difference between them with the goals, like today."

Spurs can take confidence from the fact that Arsenal have been poor on the road recently.

In their most recent domestic away match, they beat bottom-of-the-table Huddersfield Town, but they had failed to win any of their previous six Premier League games away from the Emirates. Tottenham, meanwhile, are on a four-match winning run at their temporary home.

They will need to vastly improve from their performance against Chelsea on Wednesday, though, if they are to get back to winning ways against Arsenal. Spurs did not have a shot on target at Stamford Bridge:

And their defence was not up to usual standard, with goalkeeper Hugo Lloris performing particularly poorly and making errors for both Chelsea's goals in the 2-0 defeat.

That will have to change against Arsenal, as Mesut Ozil, Henrikh Mkhitaryan, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang and Alexandre Lacazette all looked sharp against Bournemouth.

Despite the fact that they were legitimate title challengers as recently as Saturday, Spurs are a third consecutive defeat away from being in crisis.

Win against Arsenal, and they will still be comfortable in third and back in the winning groove following a poor week.

Lose, though, and Spurs will be on the back foot and in a scrap to finish in the top four in 2018-19.