Wenger was quick to pay tribute to Giroud, who stepped up manfully to the role of being Arsenal’s go-to man in the absence of the injured Alexis Sanchez.
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Giroud and Arsenal left no chance and grabbed the win they needed to pass their opponent and clinches the group’s second place.
Arsene Wenger believes a “special night” for his Arsenal side in the Champions League can now spur them on for the remainder of what could be a successful season.
They haven’t bowed out at the group stage since 1999-2000.
“If you look at the players who are out and the performance we produced, it was outstanding”. We knew we had to push for the third goal because it’s very risky at 2-0, and we had the flawless game.
Maxwel Cornet and Alexandre Lacazette scored to give already eliminated Lyon a consolation win, although it was all academic for Valencia anyway as Gent’s 2-1 victory at home to Zenit St Petersburg took them through.
“When you do that it creates a positive memory for rest of the season”. We missed the chance two or three years ago and also this year in Monaco so it is nice to go thorough the group stage as we were not in a good position. “I always said he has something special on that front and he showed that again against Olympiakos”.
Giroud became the seventh Arsenal player to reach double figures for goals in the Champions League. The kind of performance we had tonight was absolutely outstanding. “We want him to be efficient but where he has improved is his link play with others”.
Yes, certainly because we needed a ideal performance to score without conceding. I put my focus on staying in the competition.
Midway through the second period, Omar Elabdellaoui was perhaps harshly penalised for handling Nacho Monreal’s shot, and Giroud coolly converted the spot-kick for his first Arsenal hat-trick in his three and half years at the club.
Olympiakos, which beat Arsenal 3-2 in London, would have advanced with a draw. “It’s the Champions League, so whoever you get in the draw is going to be hard because you’ve seen teams struggle when they should go through and should be winning”.
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Cech singled out Giroud for praise after the Frenchman’s goals earned Arsenal the win needed to progress and said: ‘He scores goals when we need him. “He showed that in the game again today”. “But in the second half, we played with more freedom, fluency and incisiveness which is how we won the game”.
