Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta is urging his team to find more consistency as they prepare to travel to Manchester City on Sunday (kick-off 16:30 BST).
The Gunners have scored once in their past two matches – a 1-0 victory at Tottenham and a 0-0 draw at Atalanta – with that goal coming through centre-back Gabriel, via a corner.
“Yes, we want to improve in certain areas but in order to do that it’s important that we have to be much, much better,” Arteta said.
“We never got distances or the right relationships [against Atalanta], or put the ball in areas where they really suffer. We need to be a lot more consistent if we want the team to flow.
“For sure, we will prepare to try and win. That’s been the message already. In order to do that there are going to be things that we have to do much better than against Atalanta.
“There are some things that we have done exceptionally well and we are going to have to do them again. Because we all know we need a big performance to beat them.”
Despite the perceived lack of bite up top, Arteta is pleased with the resilience his side has shown at the start of the 2024-25 season, particularly his centre-back pair of Gabriel and William Saliba.
“They are in a great moment and have been very, very consistent for the past two seasons together,” he added.
“There is an unbelievable chemistry there and you can sense it. They gave us a lot against Atalanta – I thought they were both exceptional.
“When you see the stats and the number of goals that [Erling Haaland] scores then you can tell that he is one of the main sources. We need to stop him from scoring.”