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Arsenal lacking Chelsea's mentality, Premier League Daily guests say

LONDON, ENGLAND - JANUARY 31:  Younes Kaboul (C) of Watford celebrates scoring the opening goal with his team mate Tom Cleverley (2nd L) during the Premier
Image: Arsenal were 2-0 down inside 13 minutes against Watford on Tuesday night

Arsenal were beaten by Watford because they lack Chelsea's attitude, according to Wednesday's Premier League Daily guests.

Watford had not beaten the Gunners in the league for 29 years and went to the Emirates on Tuesday night having taken three points from a possible 21.

But Arsenal's poor start saw them concede twice inside 13 minutes, and a second-half revival yielded only Alex Iwobi's reply as they missed the chance to close the gap on Chelsea ahead of Saturday's trip to Stamford Bridge, live on Sky Sports.

The leaders will instead take a nine-point advantage into the weekend, and Dean Saunders and Leon Osman told Premier League Daily that gap at the top is down to a difference in mentality.

"They keep getting these results like they've got a soft underbelly." former Liverpool striker Saunders said.

"It's a change in mentality Arsenal need.

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"They're not a machine like Chelsea. You look at Chelsea and they've got these two players sat in front of the defence - Nemanja Matic and N'Golo Kante - who are 8/10 every week, they're unselfish and do the dirty jobs.

"I don't know if Arsenal have enough players to get them through games like that, and do they show enough respect to the opposition? I don't think so at times. They turn up and just try to play the way Arsenal play."

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Wenger admitted after the game his players were not mentally ready to deal with Watford's early aggression.

And Osman, whose 16 years at Everton saw him come up against several generations of Arsenal teams, said: "That's probably the manager's fault - it's his role to get players ready to fire as soon as the first whistle goes.

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Arsenal 1-2 Watford

"Arsenal suffer from lacking that real drive, that real battling spirit that when they're not playing well they can still win games.

"For the first half last night Watford were certainly up for the game, they ran all over Arsenal and Arsenal weren't quite up to the challenge.

"If that were Chelsea and things weren't going right I would still have expected it to be 0-0 at half-time, and Chelsea to be able to go on and win the second half and win the game. Arsenal gave themselves too much to do."

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