Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta believes that his side's "desire for revenge" was a key factor in their 2-0 win over Newcastle United at St James' Park on Sunday.
Twelve months ago, the Gunners produced a passive performance against Eddie Howe's side at the back end of last season, losing 2-0 and missing out on a place in the Champions League.
However, Arteta's men produced one of their finest defensive displays of the campaign to avenge that loss in the North-East, prevailing by an identical scoreline to keep their title hopes alive.
Following Sunday's success, goalkeeper Aaron Ramsdale revealed that Arteta had played his team a clip of last year's loss to Newcastle from their Amazon documentary, which showed the Gunners looking dejected in the dressing room while being subjected to a scathing Arteta rant.
Speaking in his post-game press conference, Arteta admitted that he did not see the look on his players' faces while they were re-watching the video, but he knew that his squad had a need for vengeance burning in their bellies.
"I was looking at the video so I didn't see their faces. You don't have to be a genius to see it. The word was pain and then the desire for revenge. I think they had that today in their bellies," football.london quotes Arteta as saying.
"We had to feel it. It wasn't enough just to talk about it, we had to feel it, we had to see it, we had to recognise our faces. Not just the players but what it meant for the staff as well.
"That's football. You can win or lose, but that feeling that we didn't do enough on the day, we had to put it right. I think the word to describe it is pride.
"When you have question marks you have to resolve them straight away. When you have the emotions we had last year in that dressing room, you have to feel them again, realise how nasty they are and then find a way to approach the game differently because demands were going to be different from last year. The boys did that extremely well so I'm really proud of them."
Arsenal could barely venture out of their own half inside the opening 10 minutes, as Jacob Murphy struck the post while a penalty for a Jakub Kiwior handball was overturned, with the ball striking the centre-back's thigh first.
A sublime Martin Odegaard strike - his 15th of the season in the Premier League - from 25 yards gave the Gunners the lead against the run of play in the 14th minute, and a Fabian Schar own goal in the second period handed Arsenal a healthy cushion.
The performances of Odegaard, Jorginho and Ramsdale - who made several crucial stops - were all widely praised, and Arteta affirmed that all of his players would have needed to produce their best individual displays of the season to come away with maximum points.
"It was very different that's for sure yes. It was needed. They are a very good team, the atmosphere they created is incredible so we needed a much better performance than any game we've played this season," Arteta added.
"I said to the players, to win today you're going to have to be individually the best performance of the season. If not, you're not gonna win here. Today feels the best because the last one feels that way."
Arsenal have moved onto 81 points from 35 games this season and are now only one adrift of Manchester City, although the champions boast a game in hand.
The Gunners are now guaranteed to finish in the top two of the Premier League table and return to the Emirates to host free-scoring Brighton & Hove Albion next weekend. body check tags ::
