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Wenger on comeback, Podolski and Ramsey

Arsene Wenger spoke to the media after his side beat West Ham United 3-1 on Boxing Day. 

Read a transcript of what he had to say below:

on the teams performance…
I am delighted because overall I feel that we controlled the game but I we had a difficult period where the game could have changed. That was in the first 10 minutes of the second half where West Ham scored. They had a header on a cross which could have made it 2-0. That was certainly the turning point of the game but after that we had plenty of chances in the first half, we couldn't take our chances but after that we responded very well and won the game in a convincing way.

on whether he was worried or confident at 1-0…
I have confidence but I have confidence and [still] I worry. Because that's the nature of the game, you always worry but I'm proud of the character of this team because they always are focused and try to do well and respond. They did it but football is football.

"I believe we had a difficult period just now but honestly that was mainly down to the schedule we had"

Arsene Wenger

on the amount of first-half chances…
The positive is that we created chances, the negative is that we didn't take them. There is sometimes a guilt flying around the team when you don't take your chances you think basically we deserved to be punished and we were. For us it was down to not to make a defensive mistake and not to rush our game in the second half but we had our backs to the wall very quickly.

on West Ham's chances at the start of the second half…
Yes. What happened is that we were under a little bit of shock because we felt that we should have been two or three up. We had of course to open our game up even more and to give them some chances on the counter attacks.

on the seriousness of Ramsey's injury…
It looks [serious]. It looks like a thigh strain. I don't know how serious the thigh strain is but the Christmas period certainly is over for him. It was his birthday today.

on how long he will be out for…
I don't know how long. We will see tomorrow morning.

on Ramsey's gestures when he got injured…
He knew straight away but we have to see.

on Podolski's impact…
Yes we had two real wingers from that moment on and it made a huge difference because we had good width in our game and that created many problems for West Ham.

"The team wants to do well and the character is great"

Arsene Wenger

on what Podolski can bring to the team…
He has been out for four four months, he has not played one game. I try to get him slowly back to competitiveness and he has shown he can have a huge impact because he can score and make goals - he can give assists. But on the pitch we had Podolski and Walcott and Giroud and Ozil and Cazorla you know when you lose the ball you can be a bit vulnerable but we had to go for it.

on whether his side answered some big questions…
Yes. I agree and would we not have won we would have had to answer many questions today. That was a kind of game that of course many people would have questioned us had we not won today and even more if we had lost.

on proving that his team are title contenders…
Yes. For us we have another good game now on Sunday at Newcastle who are in full confidence as well so that will be another test. The team wants to do well and the character is great. The concentration is top. I believe we had a difficult period just now but honestly that was mainly down to the schedule we had. I think that the schedule was absolutely horrendous but we can show that in the future.

on getting momentum from this result…
When you do not win for four games it's important to come back for the confidence level of your environment and yourself as well to win.

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