Wenger grateful for fans' support following huge win vs. Newcastle
Arsene Wenger believes he has the respect of 99.9% of Arsenal fans following his side's 4-1 win over Newcastle.
The Arsenal boss was abused by a handful of supporters at Stoke station last Saturday after their 3-2 defeat at the Britannia Stadium. Wenger was facing the Emirates crowd for the first time since that incident and gave the home faithful plenty to cheer as Olivier Giroud and Santi Cazorla both scored twice in a victory that lifts Arsenal to within two points of third placed Manchester United.
Wenger's name was sung by the supporters at the Emirates and the manager paid tribute to the way the crowd reacted.
"I have worked 18 years in this country and I am grateful for that but 99.9% it is people with full respect even when they are not happy, I can take the 0.01%," he said. "It's nice to hear your name sung â I am thankful for that. What we want is our fans to be happy because we win football games. My job is to win football games and when I don't do it I can understand why they are not happy."
Wenger was also delighted with the way his Arsenal side controlled the game and broke through a Newcastle defense that had only conceded 10 goals in eight away games this season before their visit to north London.
"We had a good dynamic, looked good going forward and looked dangerous against a team that defends very well," he said. "We had dynamic that we wanted to have. We knew that Newcastle have had slow starts as well and are strong in the second half, it was very important to score in the first half but you cannot just decide that, you have to do it.
"The crowd was behind the team, a bit edgy at some stages because they knew when we were in trouble, but overall I think we controlled the game quite well when you see we were a bit depleted at the back and we played very well."
Giroud, who scored two of the goals with Santi Cazorla also adding a brace, told Sky Sports 1: "It's nice to hear the fans supporting the boss and obviously it's a fantastic night for us and we're happy for that.
"It's always the same when you're losing, the first one in front of the criticism is the boss. We will always be all together, keep the faith, keep working hard and I think there's no thoughts about changing the boss, because he's still the man for the situation I think."
Cazorla, who celebrated his 30th birthday on Saturday, added: "I'm very happy today, but the most important thing was the win and the team played very well. We need to work hard in training every day and we have a big game against Liverpool next week."
