Liverpool can compete with anyone says Skrtel

It also bailed out a defence that Wenger admitted in his post-match press conference was “insecure” after the late withdrawal of first-choice centre-backs Per Mertesacker and Laurent Koscielny due to injury.

The home side were unjustly disallowed a goal early in the contest but found themselves on the back foot for the rest of the first half, with only a superb close-range save from Petr Cech keeping Christian Benteke from giving Liverpool the lead.

Arsenal next travels to Newcastle on Saturday, when Liverpool hosts West Ham. I leave judgement to everybody else, the assessment of the quality of my work.

Liverpool defender Martin Skrtel has a warning for Premier League pace-setters Manchester City and defending champions Chelsea – Brendan Rodgers’ team are not scared of anyone.

When all the football pundits were dismissing Arsenal and our chances of winning the Premier League title a couple of years ago, it really wound me up, as we were top of the table and playing the best football.

“We have started very average I must concede”, Wenger said after the game.

Arsenal’s new central defensive pairing were caught out just two minutes in, when Coutinho’s shot from inside the box struck the crossbar after Benteke was allowed too much time and space to race away and the cut the ball back to the Brazil midfielder.

Giroud has scored 42 league goals in his Arsenal career, an impressive return. “But I know I’ve got to be patient”, he was quoted as saying by his club’s site.

“The replays suggest I was onside – it should have stood – but obviously the linesman thought it was offside”, he added.

“It was in a period of the game when we had the most problems defensively but it is a regular goal, I cant see why it was cancelled – it was clear”.

The Liverpool players waking up this morning and wondering how they didn’t take all three points.

The Reds took a point from a pulsating contest at the Emirates as they dominated the first half before having to deal with a second-half onslaught from the Gunners.

Liverpool, with assured performances from full-backs Nathaniel Clyne and Joe Gomez, maintained their unbeaten start to the season with a third consecutive clean sheet.

Cech pulled off his first of two exceptional saves on 39 minutes when he bravely got down to save from Benteke after the Belgian hit-man had been teed up in front of goal by Roberto Firmino.