Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger admits they were fortunate with their victory over Aston Villa.
Villa winger Marc Albrighton scored the 20,000th Premier League goal and Arsenal striker Robin van Persie equalled Thierry Henry's club record for the most Premier League goals - 34 - in a calendar year.
But Yossi Benayoun's late header from a Van Persie corner saw the Gunners to bounce back from the weekend reversal against Manchester City.
"We were a bit unlucky on Sunday against City and today maybe we were a bit lucky.
"But overall it was important to restart with a win. We had two difficult away games where we had a to give everything physically.
"In the first half we controlled the game quite well. In the second half when Villa came back to 1-1, we had a little bit of a difficult period.
"Then we stabilised the game again and in the last 15 minutes you could feel we were on top of the game again.
"But if Villa continue to play like that, they will quickly come up in the table because they had an outstanding game."Wenger said: "I can only congratulate Villa. They played well and gave everything. We got very late three points that are vital for us.
