Mikel Arteta was pleased to see his Arsenal side find a way to win as they beat London rivals West Ham United 1-0 at the Emirates on Saturday afternoon.

It was far from a vintage performance from the Gunners, but Alexandre Lacazette's winner with 78 minutes on the clock secured all three points to boost their bid for a European place next season.

Arteta was delighted to see his side pick up the win, saying: "I'm really happy with the result because big teams find a way when they don't have the best day.

"It's obvious that it wasn't our best day in terms of performance, but they find a way to win it.

"You can build from there, you can learn and take the positives and the negatives in a much better way.

"The unity, the solidarity and desire the players are showing, at the end it pays a price, and today we didn't pay a price."

Arsenal's winner was given after a lengthy VAR review which lasted almost four minutes and although the system has been criticised, Arteta joked: "I am very pleased with the VAR tonight.

"When the goal was disallowed I thought 'okay that's fine'. Then my staff came from the bench and said 'it's a goal'.

"But then after two or three minutes, I don't know how long, then I wasn't very positive about the outcome."

A good run of form in the Premier League under Arteta has seen Arsenal go eight games unbeaten and although this hasn't been reflected in their league position, they are now just five points behind fifth-placed Chelsea with a game in hand.

The Spaniard knows there is still plenty of work to do though, adding: "It's only turning a corner in terms of results.

"A little bit in terms of the things I want to see from my team, but they were telling me now that 'I've turned the ship around', that ship still has to turn a few times more to see what we want to see.

"It's part of the process, it doesn't happen overnight, we are positive that we can keep going on this from the eight or nine weeks that we've been here.

"It will be down to the performances that we put in and it will be related to the results."