Carragher says Arsenal 'look like title contenders' - reserves specific praise for key duo

Jamie Carragher argued that Arsenal 'look like title contenders' this season and he reserved particular praise for two of their players.

The Gunners have started the new campaign well, winning six of their first seven Premier League games.

They were beaten by Man Utd earlier this month but bounced back straight away comfortably beating Brentford.

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Arsenal had a positive run last term and appear to have kicked off after narrowly missing out on the top four.

The club recruited well this summer by bringing in Gabriel Jesus, Oleksandr Zinchenko and Fabio Vieira for significant fees.

These three players all got their start at the Emirates, and Arsenal also benefited from the return of William Saliba from his loan spell at Marseille.

The centre-back has been a revelation at the start of this campaign and Jesus has also thrived as Arsenal's focal point in attack.

Carragher has previously praised Arsenal as he thinks they have recruited very well in the transfer market:

"The thing with Arsenal, I really like what happened in the last two windows," Carragher said on The Overlap.

"You can see there's a plan in terms of 'we're going to go for young players. I think you made the mistake of going with Willian, Cederic and David Luiz, players who were too old.< /p>

"I think the players you brought in were really brave, and they weren't people who would have taken them, and the position you found yourself in, you can't go for Champions League .

"So you almost have to build this young squad. I can't watch most transfers over the last two years and thought it was a disaster.

"He looks like a good player, Odegaard coming in, Ben White is at right-back, Saliba, Zinchenko, Jesus, Martinelli for a pittance really, you haven't paid too much for money for him."

Carragher has now suggested the Gunners could challenge for the Premier League title this season.

He also praised Jesus and Saliba for helping Arsenal 'completely change':

"If you actually look at Arsenal this season and the season before, they look like title contenders," Carragher told talkSPORT.

"I've always been a big fan of Mikel Arteta, I really like how brave he was to bleed all those young players.

"Now they are 12 months older, but the signing of Jesus and Saliba is coming at the back. It almost feels like a completely changed aspect of Arsenal at the moment.

"I think they might be a lot closer than people think."