Manchester United vs Arsenal: Arsene Wenger's pre match conference transcript ahead of FA cup clash against Manchester United

Arsene Wenger on Friday morning faced the media for his pre match press briefing ahead of Monday’s FA cup game against Manche
ster United. Below is the full transcript of his press conference. The text in bold indicates the journalists questions, while the normal text indicates his response. Enjoy

Good morning Arsene, firstly let’s start with the team news. How is Gabriel doing?

Gabriel has a little harm string injury, and he will be out for 2 to 3 weeks. That means he’s not available for the weekend, certainly not for West Ham or Monaco, but after that he should be available again.

3 days to go of course until the Manchester United game, but at this early stage, are there likely to be any changes to your squad?

Look, we lose of course Gabriel in the squad, and Natcho Monreal might come back, he has a test today. So everybody else should be available in the same squad that played against Queens Park Rangers.

Seems now that majority of the squad are back fit and firing, it must be the position you need to be in.

Yes, we have a lot of competition going on in the team especially up front you know, we have plenty of offensive potential, and it makes of course every decision more difficult.

 
You’ve won nine out of your 10 FA cup quarter finals. How high is the belief ahead of Monday’s game?

We are confident, through our premiership run we feel we have the needed confidence to go to Manchester United to qualify of course, and to give absolutely everything and that’s the target of the day. Hard work, team effort and to give absolutely everything, both teams would do that and I believe it would be a very interesting game.

Arsene, you talked about your options especially up front, and I suppose that’s reflected in the fact that it’s difficult for Danny Welbeck to get in the side at the moment. I was just going to say where  does his best position lye, and how important does he remain for the team?

He’s very important Danny Welbeck. Played many many games since the start of the season, I think he has played in every single game, and his position is one of the 3 up front central wide or left wide, he can play anywhere.

It’s been suggested that his arsenal career is starting to reflect his Manchester United career. Although he’s very much respected and appreciated, he doesn’t get the game time that he might need.

If you check the statistics, you will see that it’s a wrong statement. He’s one of the players who played the most games for us.

Just the last couple of games though he has only played 2 games.

In the last couple of games, yes. You know you can make me debate on every single player. What is important is that you have moments in a season where some players play a bit less, most of the time, it’s up front, and because not every single player can play every game in the biggest part of the season. A player like Giroud plays at the moment but he missed 4 months, and during that period, Welbeck played every single game.

It’s been nearly 10 years since you won at Old Trafford. Is this present arsenal team better equipped than it’s predecessors to change that?

Look, I don’t believe too much in history, I believe just in the performance of the day. At the moment we are doing very well away from home. The size of the pitch is exactly the same everywhere, and it’s just down to how much we turn up, and how much effort we put into the game.

Given that both clubs are also battling hard for a European champions league place, is there any extra value in a victory out there in terms of psychology?

No, it’s a different competition, and for us we won the FA cup last year. We are the holders of the cup, and we want of course to keep it, and this competition is important to us, and we want to go out there and produce the result, but I don’t think it’s linked at all with the premiership.

Linked more to momentum perhaps?

Momentum, desire to win, cup is give it all on the day and that’s what it is about on Monday night

One of the big controversies this week has obviously been the spitting incident in the Newcastle-Manchester united game. I just wanted to know what your views were on that.

Look, I think it’s of course not acceptable, it’s down to the FA to deal with that, because we play on Monday night against Man United, I don’t think I’ll have too much to interfere naturally, it’s down to the FA to deal with it and until now, I felt they did very well with these kind of incidents.

One of the subjects talked about recently has also been the way that managers behave towards each other in the premier league

Why do you look at me? (Media officers laugh)

Obviously, the Hull-Sunderland game has brought into focus. Do you sense there has been a change in the way managers behave towards each other in the technical area?

No, it is isolated incidents. Ideally we want ourselves to behave in a perfect way, maybe to build a wall between the 2 dugouts, but the bigger the distance, the better it is. And in the modern stadium, I think it is much better. For instance at the emirates, we have zero incidents because we are far apart from each other. What happens when  the dugouts are very close is everybody speaks to the fourth official and then it becomes very  quickly controversial, and because it’s on a hype always, the incidents can explode and bring physical controversy, but overall, the distance between the 2 dugouts is a very important part of peace.

It used to be thought that possession and whoever dominated possession would win the game, it seems to be less and less that way. What are your thoughts on that particular correlation?

Well, I still think possession is an important part of the game. You cannot go into a game and say you do not want the ball. Sometimes when you haven’t gotten the ball because your opponent is better. Sometimes as well it’s because you lead the game 1-0, 2-0 and your team is not focused on defending the advantage, and you have to analyze it of course. Then you have to look at as well where is the possession. Is it in your own half or is it in the opponents half. If it’s in your own half, it can be a bit illusionary possession. But overall, I still think it’s very important that the sport rewards people and teams who take initiative and if we do think that it’s more important that we don’t take initiative will be very negative for the future of our sport. But I don’t think.

Arsene, just one question if I may, you spoke about it in your first answer about it been an interesting game on Monday night. Louis Van Gaal has described the race for the top 4 as a rat race. Does that put a bit of intensity and focus on Monday nights tie?

No, I think personally for me it’s a special intensity because it’s between 2 teams who have a chance to win this competition, and both teams would think if we get over this hurdle, we have a good opportunity to win the competition, and it’s more focused on the FA cup purely than on the premiership.

Arsene, as an outsider looking at what’s going on at Manchester united, what do you make about the way they are playing under Louis Van Gaal this season?

Nothing you know. I think they have a very good team and they have 53 points. Nobody gives you points in the league, and they had a bit of a difficult start, but they are getting there.

Obviously, there is this debate about the way they play, the tempo of Manchester united fans aren’t particularly happy about the style of play.

Look, we have enough problems here to keep our fans happy, so I don’t want to interfere with that at all.

But do you go with the way they play and think this is a real opportunity for this arsenal side to really stamp their authority?

Look, we will go there and try to qualify no matter how, and I do not speculate on any weakness of Man United because they always put the effort in against us, and I’m not concerned about that.

Just going back to Danny Welbeck, he has scored 7 goals this season. Are you satisfied with what he’s producing?

Look, first of all, I believe Danny Welbeck puts big team effort in, he plays very well. For me he’s an exceptional football player who will have a great future here. And I’m convinced that of course he subject raises because he is a former man united player, I’m very very happy that I bought him , and i think this guy has a great future here.

What have you made of Paul Scholes’ comments over the last 24 hours regarding Mesut Ozil, suggesting he’s going through the motions, and perhaps arsenal aren’t the side you genuinely look to and they are happy to finish in the top 4?

We are happy to go as far as we can and we want to win the title. At the moment if you look well at our run, we’ve suffered a lot after pre season from world cup syndrome and players who have been out for a long time, and the points we are behind today, we lost until October. Since October, we didn’t lose any points on anybody and I believe that we have come back in a very consistent form. Having said that, I believe about Ozil, it’s a wrong statement, and he works very hard and he’s a great player.

Following up from Scholes, he said he felt he took the easy option Ozil to come here.

I think a player like Paul Scholes would have loved to play with Mesut Ozil.

Are you surprised at some of the criticism that Louis Van Gaal has had? For all the talk about their players, they’ve lost 2 of their last 22 games. They’ve clinched all the results.

Yes, but I think today it’s like that you know. Every day you have to criticize somebody or you don’t sleep well overnight and because we are in that part of the job, we have to accept that.

Van Gaal also said that he needs time as a manager to adapt to English football. Just wonder when you came all those years ago, what was the biggest adjustment you had to make to the English game?

Look, first you adapt to your club, to your team, and after that to the players who play for you used to play in the league, so it’s less problem to adapt to the league, it’s more a problem adaptation to the style of play, to the quality of the players. It’s important you know well the players you have, and I believe as well man united is a new team because they’ve got many new players this year. When I arrived here, the stable team was used to play in the premier league.

Do you ever think what happened to united after Sir Alex Ferguson left, do you ever think such things can happen to arsenal?

No, I don’t look too much at Man United, I look at my club and what we want to achieve and how we could achieve it and I leave that to other people.

Arsene, Wolciejch was ill during the week. Is he likely to be fit?

He has a test today. If he gets through that test, he will play on Monday night.

Is that a concern for a player, especially for a goalkeeper lacking match sharpness going into a big game?

Look, Woljiech is used to playing big games, and I think he will take that as a big challenge to show his quality, and he works very hard in training and I don’t think that will be a problem.

There are years people have been saying arsenal don’t have the strength in depth. Now you do and these guys don’t get a go. You’ve got Theo Walcott who’s sat on the bench over the last few games, and people are saying “why aren’t you playing him” Isn’t that the problem you wanted to have going into the season?

We come down to that problem that people always raise these kinds of questions when you do not have enough players, but I just would like to say that we have chosen the job where competition is part of our job, and that means we cannot complain about that, we gave made that choice and I never understand completely this kind of question because this is part of our job, and our job is to serve the club and compete with other people to do as well as we can to serve the club and the only important thing is what the club achieves, all of us are only here for that.

When you take on Manchester united, do you feel you can take them on in an open attacking game, or would we be expecting a performance more like Manchester city and then talk about softening things up because in past games against Manchester united, if you play and open expansive game against them there is not always…

Look that will be decided as well by who scores the first goal because at Manchester city, we scored first, then we were more on a defencive foot because they had to come out, and that is not predictable today what will happen because what is for sure is you need a winner after the game, so that means both teams would go for it, so we have to attack well and defend well on both sides.

Mesut Ozil since his comeback from injury has covered an awful lot of ground. Do you think he’s got a point to prove?

Yes, and he knows that. We are in a job where we have in every single game to prove a point, and I believe that he has the quality; he puts a lot of effort in to help the team, and he works much harder than his style shows you know. You can cheat him a little bit by his style of play because he’s fluid, easy, subtle and he doesn’t look like he puts the effort in, but he does.

Has that surprise you or did you know when you brought him here that he had that side to his game?

I knew he had a good physical potential, but I didn’t know how good he was physically, but he has a huge physical potential.