Ian Wright at odds with Piers Morgan over Arsenal and Mikel Arteta expectations

Arsenal legend Ian Wright and lifelong fan Piers Morgan have voiced polar opposite opinions on the prospect of the Gunners finishing sixth in the Premier League.

Mikel Arteta's side are in the midst of a fiercely-competitive battle to qualify for the Champions League and find themselves in the middle of five teams chasing the final spot in the top four.

Manchester United are fourth and West Ham are fifth, while Wolves and Tottenham narrowly trail Arsenal in seventh and eighth respectively.

Crucially, the Emirates club have three games in hand on the Red Devils and the Irons, so they are the bookmakers' favourite to join Manchester City, Liverpool and Chelsea in the top four.

Despite this, Wright insists he would be happy with a sixth-place finish, as this was what he hoped for at the start of the season.

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"When you look at Arsenal, they've got Spurs, Chelsea, West Ham, Man United soon, so it's going to be tough," the former England striker told the Ringer FC podcast.

"I said at the start of the season, if we could get sixth, I would be so happy and I think Mikel Arteta would be where he should be, in and around sixth place, and then you start to progress from there.

"When you look at how everyone is doing at the moment, everyone is playing each other. If Arsenal can win games like the Wolves one, I'll be happy with that."

Arsenal battled with 10 men to edge out Wolves to a 1-0 victory last week which buoyed their top-four hopes while damaging the Molineux club's own chances.

The Gunners ended up eighth in the top flight last season, so it is not hard to see why Wright believes finishing sixth would represent "progress" under Arteta.

Playmaker Martin Odegaard certainly believes something exciting is happening in North London and, speaking to Arsenal's official website, declared: "I feel like we're building something special here... The mix is good and the team is hungry."

However, Morgan suspects the Norwegian's optimism is misguided and tempered the good mood around Arsenal by pointing out they have no chance of winning silverware this season.

Responding to Odegaard's comments, the former Good Morning Britain host wrote on Twitter: "Hmmm. We're 6th in the League, didn't qualify for Europe & got dumped out of both domestic cups before February. I'm not sure this is what 'special' looks like."

Arsenal were eliminated from the Carabao Cup by Liverpool at the semi-final stage and they crashed out of the FA Cup with a third-round loss to Nottingham Forest.