Arsene Wenger believes his Arsenal side can still challenge Manchester United for the title

Posted Saturday, September 24, 2011 by YAHOO Sport

Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger is refusing to rule out his side's chances of challenging current title-holders Manchester United to the Premier League crown.

"Of course I am worried," said Wenger of his team's early season form. "It is absolutely not realistic not to be worried when you have a team like Manchester United in front of you. The only thing we can do is focus on our performances, win our games and hope they will drop some points at some stage."

The north London side is currently undergoing its worst start to a campaign since the Frenchman took over, having picked up just four points from its opening five games.

Despite lying eleven points behind the in-form champions, Wenger maintains faith in his team’s chances of climbing back up the table.

"At the moment I am more concerned by us than them," said the Frenchman. "If they do a perfect season, they do a perfect season. Until now, only one team did that - Arsenal [alluding to the Gunners' undefeated season in 2003-04]. What is important for us is to give absolutely everything to do it [win the title], but at the moment it is too early to speak about that.

"Let's come back to a better distance with the top teams before we speak about that. If the team gets momentum, we can be very strong.”

Wenger, meanwhile, has pointed out some of the reasons behind his team’s poor start to the campaign, arguing that tough Champions League opposition, together with transfer speculation surrounding Cesc Fabregas and Samir Nasri, has affected Arsenal’s ability to play at its best.

"I still believe we paid a very heavy price for the Udinese [Champions League playoff] game, where we didn't get any credit at all. Today, they are [joint] top of the league," he added. "We had to give absolutely everything (in the Champions League game) against Dortmund and in the second half at Blackburn you could see that.

"Our start of the season was disturbed by the transfers (of Cesc Fabregas and Samir Nasri) and by the fact that we had to qualify for the Champions League. We lost a lot of energy in these games."

Now expecting a response as his side get ready to take on Bolton, the Frenchman hopes that Owen Coyle’s team will meet a reinvigorated Arsenal outfit, ready to get its Premier League season back on track.

"We just want to focus on playing our game and finding our collective play as quickly as we can," he said. There were some good signs at Blackburn, especially in the first half, and we just want to extend that kind of performance for 90 minutes. I am very positive about our ability and on a longer term that will come out."