Arsenal’s Gael Clichy has come forward to claim that it was lack of good players in the squad which reduced their ability to fight for the top-spot in the Premier League table towards the end of the season.

“I think the main reason is when you have a short team like we have got at Arsenal, it’s good because everyone has the chance to play some games," he noted.

“So the atmosphere is great but also when you miss players, like five of those, including Tomas Rosicky, one of the best midfielders in Europe, Robin van Persie one of the best strikers, Eduardo, that’s big blow and you can’t do anything about that.

“Look at Chelsea and Man United, you take Ronaldo, Rooney and Tevez out, and Chelsea you take Terry, Carvalho and Drogba out, it’s not the same team.

“So it’s really unlucky, I don’t know if we would have won the league with those players but for sure we’d have had more chances of doing it.

“We’ve got five players injured and it’s really difficult to cope with that and we tried, we tried really hard, and of course when you make the mistakes we made against Birmingham and Liverpool away, it’s difficult.

“We have plenty of quality and next season will be better.”