Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger has addressed a number of subjects, including selection debates and injury problems in his post-match news conference after the 2-0 win home win against Stoke on Saturday.
On Saturday’s winning performance, the Frenchman said: “They scored so it is good for them, but I believe we put in a very strong performance.
Technically we had our moments in the first half and we played the football we wanted to play and created several chances.
Maybe if I wanted to be critical I could say that that there is too big a difference between the number of chances we created and the number of goals we scored but that will come quickly once you win your games at home.
After failing to sign a striker in this summer’s window, the club has been left with two strikers to choose between and for the last couple of games, the boss has opted to play Theo Walcott over Olivier Giroud in the centre forward position.
Wenger explained his thinking behind the decision to field the English International: “To use the movement of Walcott. I know Stoke are a compact, organised team in their own half and Theo could find little pockets to get in their and maybe that you get two or three chances to counter attack at home so maybe you can use that.
He scored a great goal because you needed technical quality to score and timing in the finish. It is good Giroud came on scored as well.
On Walcott’s overall performance, the boss said: “He has chances. He can be a prolific goalscorer.
When you come out of the game and look at the amount of chances he scored. The bigger the belief he has to score the more he will score. But he gets in good situations.
January signing Gabriel has started the last three games and in all three, Arsenal have not conceded. In the last two, Laurent Koscielny and Gabriel played together at the heart of the defence – and in these two games, the Gunners have managed to shut out the opponents, keeping the work goalkeeper Petr Cech has to do to a minimum.
On the Gabriel-Koscielny partnership, Wenger said: “They looked very strong as Stoke had quite an offensive force out there and I felt Koscielny was outstanding and Gabriel had a very good game. Coquelin as well was outstanding so we had a good triangle in the centre of the park. It was very strong.”
On absent defender Per Mertesacker the Frenchman said: “He should not worry. He should just come back and play. It is good we have four centre-backs and this produces a problem.
If Walcott plays and scores everybody says that Walcott is good but before the game everybody says I should buy a striker but if I had a bought a striker then Walcott would not have played.
So it is always a vicious circle and at some stage you just have to believe in your players and Gabriel has shown that he can play with Mertesacker, he can play with Koscielny and he can be a great defender.
Arsenal currently sit third in the Premier League table, level on points with Manchester United and only five behind top of the table Manchester City.
On the club’s league position, Wenger said: “When you lose your first home game it is difficult to predict that we would be in that position as the confidence grew quickly.
It was important to respond in our second game at Crystal Palace lets not forget that and we did well.
Commenting on the injury status of England international Danny Welbeck, who recently had knee surgery, he said: “It was a shock of course. I think Welbeck can play in every position up front and he is a fantastic guy.
To see him work for three or four months and then be ruled out again for three or four months is difficult to understand but we have to deal with that.
I can understand that people say that we have to look out for a striker but we honestly did not find anyone.
Another man out injured is Jack Wilshere and after rumours of another setback, the Arsenal manager failed to soothe fans’ fears by commenting: “Wilshere progresses slowly.
We will know more about Jack in the next few days and hopefully it will be good news but he progresses.
