Kieran Gibbs believes Arsenal’s defensive woes will be sorted out sooner rather than later

Kieran Gibbs helped save Arsenal’s blushes against Shrewsbury in the Carling Cup and then insisted the Gunners’ players are “100 per cent” behind under-fire boss Arsene Wenger.

Gibbs headed home a vital first-half equaliser against the League Two side on Tuesday night, just when it looked like the minnows might cause a huge shock.

But while a place in round four is welcome, it does not ease Arsenal’s situation in the Premier League, where they sit fourth from bottom after three defeats in five games ahead of Saturday’s clash with Bolton.

And Gibbs admitted: “It’s not been the easiest of months, let alone the easiest of weeks. But I can assure everyone the team is together and you can see from the stats of the games what we are doing is right.

“We are not getting the results at the minute but we are looking to turn that around as soon as possible so that we can lift the club.

“There are some errors that we cause. We bring a lot of trouble on ourselves at times but it happens in football. We are an extremely attacking team – we produce a lot of flair in our game. I think we know that we can’t be amazing going forward and the same going back.”

Gibbs, who did not figure in Saturday’s 4-3 defeat at Blackburn or the 8-2 mauling at Old Trafford, was also adamant that most of the players at the club have not been affected by the criticism of recent weeks, and that all of them are fully behind Wenger.

“If we haven’t shown that [we are playing for the manager] already then I am sure we will. I don’t think we need to show what type of man Arsene Wenger is.

“If we need to do that, there is no point being here. What the man has done is incredible. We are 100 per cent behind the manager.

“The criticism has brought us closer together. It doesn’t affect a lot of the foreign players because they don’t see a lot of the media.

“They are professionals – we know what we want to achieve. We’ll ignore everything and just get on with what we’ve got to do.

“We just have to stand up and not hide away if the results don’t go our way. Everyone needs to to stand up and be counted.”