Wenger: 'I expect Walcott to miss Alkmaar'

on Theo Walcott's injury...
"He has a bruised knee, it is swollen and difficult to assess at the moment. Is it a medial knee ligament that is twisted or just a kick? The fact that he says he felt a little unstable when he was running is not good news. We don't know yet how much of his pain is down to the kick and how much is down to the fact he twisted his ligament.

"We will assess the situation tomorrow morning. He will be scanned and if it is just a kick he has a good chance to play on Tuesday night [at Alkmaar]. If it is more, he will not play on Tuesday. I believe personally he will not be available on Tuesday at least. It is not a cruciate for example but it could be more than a week if it is a twisted ligament."

on the game against Birmingham...
"We were cruising, in control, two goals up and it looked like we could get more. You were wondering who would score the third goal. But we made a mistake defensively and they got back to 2-1. In the second half we did not have the same fluency or control in the game, not the same pace, but in the end I still believe 3-1 is a fair result because we had plenty of chances. Birmingham regrouped very quickly when they lost the ball and we lacked a little bit of sharpness. I feel also we tried to force the situation a little bit individually, especially in the second half, and that's why we didn't score more goals."

on Alex Song's defensive-midfield role...
"He is strong and smooth. He is not rigid, he is agile. He is a slalom player and is not a straight-line player. He uses that very well, he has a good combination of strengths and agility and I believe as well he uses his technique in a very intelligent way. He likes a tackle. Cameroon people are strong, you know? In Africa they call them the Germans of Africa because of their strong bodies."

on the tackle by Ridgewell on Walcott...
"I wasn't happy with it. It was a tackle cut through without any restriction. I felt it was a tackle meant to impress but I want to see it again - that was my first impression from the bench. It looked a quick and hard challenge from outside. I don't know - did he want to play the ball? He certainly went through him and if he touched the ball only it is part of the game."

on Arshavin's late clincher...
"That's the football we love. I believe the second goal was fantastic as well and that's the game we play. I believe when we stick to our game, when we focus to play our game, it looks like we can play the ball through any space and that we can create space just as we want. That is something fantastic but we have of course to be focused on that and keep our composure."

[Saturday, October 17, 2009]

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