• Premier League

Ramsey: Arsenal in six-way title fight

Aaron Ramsey says Arsenal won't be bullied by their title rivals away from home © PA Photos

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Aaron Ramsey believes Arsenal are in a six-way title fight this season with the Premier League more competitive than ever.

The midfielder's injury-time winner against Crystal Palace gave Arsenal their first opening-day win in five years and Ramsey feels every point is going to matter.

"It's going to be more difficult to win it because I think there are six teams now," Ramsey told Sky Sports News.

"The so-called bigger teams are going to drop points throughout the season. The key when that time comes is to go to the next game and get back to winning ways.

"It's a long season and I'm sure there are going to be many twists and turns. There's going to be a few teams fighting for it."

Arsenal led the Premier League for 128 days last season but their title challenge was derailed by heavy defeats away to Manchester City, Chelsea and Liverpool.

Arsene Wenger's side eventually finished seven points short of champions City, but Ramsey feels they will not be bullied in the same way this year.

"Manchester City are a big team and Chelsea are a big team," added Ramsey. "It's all about opinions. We're quite a small team by comparison and we like to get the ball down. Maybe they won't be as agile and we can play around them.

"It helps those teams with power and drive but I'm sure we'll be playing the other way.

"These teams are always capable of getting results off each other. The Premier League was really tight last season and I think it's only going to get tighter and tighter.

"The biggest thing we need to do is to pick up points against the bigger teams away from home. If we'd have nicked a win or a couple draws in those games last season we would have been up there on 84 or 85 points."

Another heavy defeat came against Everton at Goodison Park but Ramsey believes Arsenal can demonstrate how far they have developed during pre-season when the two teams meet on Saturday.

Ramsey said: "We lost to Everton away last year so we go there on Saturday and we'll be looking to put things right and hopefully come away with a good result."

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