Unai Emery believes his Arsenal side proved that the gap between them and England’s top sides has closed between their defeats against Manchester City and Chelsea and their hugely impressive 1-1 draw with Liverpool.

Alexandre Lacazette’s superb strike in the 82nd minute saved Arsenal a point but Unai Emery seemed to believe his side had deserved far more having dominated most of the game at the Emirates.

Not for the first time in recent years defensive errors cost the Gunners as Bernd Leno palmed Sadio Mane’s cross into the path of goalscorer James Milner but, unlike their opening day defeat to Manchester City, Arsenal did not fold meekly after going behind.

Instead they roared back and looked the more likely winners in the dying minutes, though their best chance was a curled effort from Hector Bellerin that never really looked like sneaking in.

Emery insisted he would need time to further close the game but is convinced his side are moving in the right direction. He told Standard Sport: “Progress takes time, a long time. It’s difficult to ask for a lot of time but we need it.

“Manchester City, Chelsea, Liverpool are in front of us. I think in these three matches, today is more complete a game for us.”

He would subsequently add: “Today is a test of who we are against one team like Liverpool. After City and Chelsea maybe today we’re nearer.

“We need this quality every match, next week against Wolverhampton here the match is just as important.”

If there were encouraging signs in Arsenal’s performance Emery insisted he was only “50 per cent” pleased with the result, with a point likely to mean Spurs leapfrog them into fourth place later on Saturday evening.

Asked whether Arsenal had deserved more, the head coach said: I don’t know, sadly. I’m happy with our performance. Today the balance in 90 minutes is greater, there was more control against them.

“It’s very difficult not to let them have chances also. You need a little luck sometimes in matches. When we are attacking we need to find our goal. 1-1 at the end I think is a good result for how the match went.

“We’re 50 per cent happy. Maybe we could have lost in one moment and in the 90 minutes balance we could have won.”