The Gunners head to Bolton on Saturday in their worst run of league form in nine seasons after taking only four points from the last five games to allow both Manchester United and Chelsea to overtake them at the top of the table.

Manager Arsene Wenger believes his side have paid a high price for some poor defensive displays - which was evident at Stamford Bridge last weekend where Toure and central partner William Gallas failed to deal with the threat of Didier Drogba and Nicolas Anelka as the Blues came from behind to win 2-1.

Ivory Coast international Toure, 27, has, though, been one of the most consistent performers since he came into the first team.

The mild-mannered African, who arrived at Highbury in February 2002, learned from legendary former Gunners such as Tony Adams and Martin Keown, who were renowned for their no-nonsense approach.

"One who really helped me a lot was Martin Keown," Toure said, speaking in the April edition of the official Arsenal magazine.

"I have played with him several times and he helped me establish myself in the squad.

"He (was) always giving me advice, teaching me some of the intelligent things and also some nasty things you need to do in the game.

"Martin was an amazing player for Arsenal. He had a great career and had a good attitude on the pitch - he was always involved, always helping the team, always pushing people to encourage each other and raising the level because you can't rely on just one person to do that."

Despite now trailing leaders Manchester United by six points - and one behind Chelsea - Arsenal are still not yet out of the title race, as key fixtures between the top three are still to come.

Toure accepts it is a tough battle for the championship, but insists the Gunners must focus only on their own performances rather than worry about what might happen elsewhere.

"It seems that this season the title race involves three teams and this shows that the league is really strong at the moment," he said.

"But we have to concentrate on ourselves, and on what we have to do over the remaining games - if we win the rest of our games we will have a great chance of winning the title."

Wenger reported a clean bill of health from those who returned from international duty to the training ground on Thursday morning before he set off to the Emirates Stadium where French president Nicolas Sarkozy met Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

The Arsenal manager accepts his team must tighten up at the back if they are to put pressure on leaders United.

Wenger said: "What we want to do is perform well as a team again and we know we can do that.

"At Chelsea we played okay, but we have to improve. Recently what punished us a lot is that defensively we have made big mistakes."