Arsenal display delights Wenger
Tuesday, December 7, 2004
Article summary
Arsène Wenger praised Arsenal FC for "always being in control" in the 5-1 win against Rosenborg BK.
Article body
Arsène Wenger, Arsenal manager
The target was to qualify, and we did that tonight with five goals and by finishing top of the group so I am very happy. I set us three big targets this week: to beat Birmingham City [FC] on Saturday, to qualify tonight and to beat Chelsea [FC] on Sunday, so we have achieved two out of three. As far as Europe is concerned, the job is done - it would have been very hard for us if we had gone out tonight. We have quality and belief and it was important to qualify. We want to be among the best in the world. It was not an easy game but Fabregas scored a great goal and the second half was a lot quieter. When they came back to 3-1 there was a little moment [of worry] but we always controlled the game and looked dangerous when we won the ball back.
Thierry Henry, Arsenal striker
The youngsters showed they were old enough to play and if you are good enough then you are old enough. We still had our destiny in our hands and if we won we could still finish top and that is what happened. Now we can concentrate on Chelsea. You never know when [a bad spell] is going to come - we can only try to rectify that on the pitch. It is not enough to qualify. We are going to see if we can improve and get better.
Per Joar Hansen, Rosenborg coach
Arsenal showed us a level tonight we could not really reach and the match was all over by half-time. They scored all their goals on the counterattack and that was exactly what we talked about before the game. We said that it shouldn't happen but they ran faster, jumped higher and showed us how to hit the target and we made too many mistakes. We had a completely different plan to how we performed in the end and you can't play like this at this level. If you do, you will be severely punished.
Frode Johnsen, Rosenborg midfield player
We made too many mistakes defensively, it's as simple as that. And we also wasted several chances of our own. I think we created about five or six good chances to score but then we make too many mistakes in our build-up play in our own half and then it looks a bit silly.