But in Friday’s media conference ahead of Sunday’s Premier League visit to Aston Villa, Wenger had nothing but praise for his countryman, who has 13 goals in 23 appearances across all competitions this season.
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Giroud finished the opening round of this season’s European tournament with five goals to his name, level with Bayern Munich’s Thomas Muller and Luis Suarez of Barcelona. “It makes players stronger and that is what happened”.
“I had a good feeling before the game but after that you never know – you still have to get chances to score – but now it’s done”.
“He has gone through this calendar year with ups and downs but overall it is typical Olivier Giroud”. “That means that when it’s not working for him, he puts effort in”.
Yet it was the way in which the Gunners got the result they needed despite a spate of recent injuries that had Wenger purring.
Ozil again started everything with a clipped pass to Joel Campbell, with the former Olympiacos loanee controlling well under pressure before sliding a flawless pass into the path of Giroud for the France striker to sweep home. It looks like Leicester are producing the consistency and quality. After, of course you want him to be efficient as well.
“I think competition is very important in the big teams”, Flamini told reporters.
“You have to cope in our game, you are questioned and in his job, centre-forward, you are questioned even more”. If you don’t score for three games, you’re questioned again.
Giroud opened the scoring in Greece with a powerful header in the first half, doubled their advantage with a calm left-footed finish quickly after the restart, and recorded his first hat-trick for Arsenal with a penalty.
“They can play together, like on Wednesday night”. It depends on the global balance of the team, it is a bit more different when Alexis is there as well. “They didn’t want to go to the Europa League”, Mourinho said, as his team avoided the fate of United, forced to settle for the consolation of dropping into the secondary continental competition after defeat at Wolfsburg on Tuesday.
“Whoever we end up playing, we must respect them”, said Walcott.
With seven key first-team players missing through injury, manager Arsene Wenger recalled Theo Walcott after his recovery from a calf problem. “I am grateful to the fans of Olympiacos for their friendliness and warm reaction towards me, it was very touching”.
The eight group winners will be drawn against the eight runners-up, although teams from the same country can not play each other.
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“The great thing with this game compared to Monaco last season was that we were very patient, with the build -up play”.
