RVP wants maximum effort

Robin van Persie: Urging Arsenal to push forward and make it six straight wins against Everton

Robin van Persie has urged his Arsenal team-mates to keep up the intensity for the rest of the season and prove they can be consistent over a period of months.

The Gunners have surged into the top four on the back of five straight Premier League wins and Van Persie has been encouraged by the spirit they have shown.

However, he wants to continue pushing forward as he knows nothing less than 100 per cent commitment will produce the right result on Wednesday at Everton - where rivals Tottenham, Chelsea and Manchester City have all been beaten this year.

"It is tough to play the way we all want. We need to be consistent and get a win over the line, like at Liverpool," Van Persie told Arsenal Player.

"We did it now, and we can enjoy it, but we need to show it again (at Everton) and it may even be a harder game, but we have to give it our maximum and see where it ends."

Ugly wins

Arsenal have come from behind to win in four of their five victories, the latest with a dramatic stoppage-time winner from Thomas Vermaelen to beat Newcastle 2-1 at Emirates Stadium.

Van Persie added: "If you look at the last couple of weeks, we showed we have a lot of character in our side, and we can be proud of that.

"Now we need to show that over a period of a whole year. We need to have a run like that for months and even win the ugly games.

"We showed signs that we can do it because against Liverpool we didn't play well, but still nicked it.

"We came from behind in the past four games and ended up winning the game. That shows we can do it, not only once or twice or three times, but lots of times. So why not show it 20 times or whenever it is needed?"

Gibbs pride

Full-back Kieran Gibbs agrees that the recent run of good form shows Arsenal do not know when they are beaten.

Gibbs said: "In previous seasons you wouldn't have thought we would have the strength to come back, but now we don't really think about the score, we just keep playing.

"The team is showing great character at the minute and we need to keep that going.

"Football changes so much. We have seen over the last few seasons that anything can happen now and it is important for us to cement our place (in the top four) and keep winning."