News

Wenger on the win, Olympiacos and Alexis

Arsène Wenger spoke to the media after Arsenal's 3-0 win against Dinamo Zagreb on Tuesday. This is what he said:

on the game…
We played at a good pace, produced a game of quality that we wanted. I believe the speed of our movement and passing gave Zagreb a problem. From then on, once we had scored the first goal you could see the chances were coming. It was important that we did not concede the first goal as we looked dangerous [going] forward. Overall we had a game of quality that we controlled well.

on qualification chances…
What we wanted was to come out of this game with a chance to qualify and we needed to do the job and Bayern Munich needed to do the job and they did that well. It gives us a chance but how big the chance is I don’t know. I believe we can do it.

on having to win by two goals…
We just need to win. It might not be enough, but what I mean is if we go ahead 1-0 then they will be in a situation where they could lose it and we will be a situation in the game which we can win it, so we have to go there to win the game. If you can win 1-0, you can win 2-0. It is a must-win for us and the task is very clear.

on Olympiacos…
Let’s forget that and focus on the Premier League with Norwich on Sunday and take care of the Premier League again.

ADVERT

on not resting Alexis…
Because the break makes him tired.

on how good Alexis was…
I don’t know how important percentage wise he is but he is just a very important player because at the moment we have real strikers. We have Giroud and Alexis so at the moment all these strikers are needed. Giroud had a little problem with his ankle over the weekend but I decided to give [him] a breather. Hector Bellerin, I took him off because he had a groin problem just before so I had to take them off meaning I could not take Alexis off. We now
have five days to recover.

on Alexis not getting tired…
I would have loved to do it tonight (rest Alexis) but I [had] two different options. Once it is 3-0 you are not in a position where you need him to work back and when you put him central up front you can spare a bit of energy. It is not like you have to go up and down. I tried to compromise a little bit and give a break to Giroud and not take a risk with Bellerin.

on not spending in the transfer window…
I don’t agree with you. If you come out with me, you will see I like to spend money! It is you the press that have given me that reputation but my friends don’t think that.

on Ozil, Alexis and Campbell…
Tonight Campbell offensively was outstanding. He was dangerous from the start and the three had an outstanding performance tonight.

on responding after West Brom…
It was important to respond tonight as confidence can drop quickly. Hopefully we can do that again at Norwich.

on who will be back for the game against Olympiacos…
For Olympiacos, apart from tonight, Oxalde-Chamberlain will certainly be back while Theo Walcott has a chance.

on Coquelin’s scan…
It is what we feared basically. Let’s be realistic, it will be 12 weeks.

on if he requires surgery…
No. He does not need surgery. It was a knee ligament so it will be 12 weeks.

on having already played before at Olympiacos…
Sometimes when we played at Olympiacos we had already qualified, this time we go to Olympiacos heading to qualify. It will be tough but we have to believe we can do it and I believe we can do it.

on the atmosphere at Olympiacos…
You have to trust Uefa and organisations to do that well. On the pitch the rules are respected and you never normally have a problem so we have a chance on that front.

on if he thought Arsenal could progress after the loss against Bayern Munich…
The result on the night was bad as Olympiacos won on the night in the last minute against Zagreb. On the night I thought it would have been very difficult. Then it depended on us and on the other result against Bayern, so at least tonight we are in with a chance. Let’s make right what we did not do right until now.

See Full List

Fixtures & Results

Premier League
Ticket Info