Forward Theo Walcott says he doesn’t pay any attention to Arsenal’s title rivals as they look to take advantage of an “unpredictable” Premier League this season.

The Gunners sit second after eight games but they trail leaders Manchester City on goal difference alone. Arsene Wenger’s men have won six, drawn one and lost one, scoring 19 times in the process, which is the joint-best haul along with the Citizens.

Walcott has been one of the best performers for the north London outfit and already boasts four top-flight strikes, including a brace in Saturday’s 3-2 victory over struggling Swansea.

Arsenal, who are 6.00 to win the Premier League, are set to face the north-east duo of Middlesbrough and Sunderland next in the Premier League before going head-to-head with rivals Tottenham at the start of next month.

The England international insists he doesn’t keep an eye on the league table as he prefers to just focus on Arsenal’s performances.

Walcott said: “With the squad we have, if we keep players fit, with players coming back, then who knows? You can’t really call the Premier League this year.

It’s so unpredictable. “We’ve been in this situation before. We started off this season better than we have recently.

There’s always some sort of blip but hopefully we’re not going to have that this year. “I don’t look at the table. I genuinely don’t.

I feel all we can do is control ourselves and not really hope that other teams get results on our behalf. We can only control ourselves – if we play well, we win games and that’s all we can do.

“I know it’s a really simple and easy thing to say but that’s genuinely the case. There’s no point in wasting energy on other teams when we control that.”