Wenger: Good drivers have accidents

Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger has compared his side’s 6-0 loss to Chelsea to a good driver having a car accident.

In what was supposed to be a celebration of Wenger’s 1,000th game in charge of the club, the Frenchman watched his team concede four first-half goals in a demoralising derby loss on Saturday.

Wenger said the response to the loss had been an overreaction after his team had kept clean sheets against Tottenham and held Bayern Munich to a 1-1 draw.

Along with the loss to Chelsea, Arsenal have been beaten 5-1 by Liverpool and crushed 6-3 by Manchester City this season.

“You have to put that into perspective, we just came out of two convincing results at Bayern Munich and at Tottenham with a very solid defensive performance so you have to think that was an accident,” Wenger said.

“How do you deal with the accident? You repair the damage and you go for the next one.

“An accident has happened, that doesn’t mean that you’re not a good driver. It just means we have played about 40 games this season and it’s not what happened on Saturday that reflects the quality of this team.”

Wenger’s men have a quick chance to bounce back with a meeting against Swansea at Emirates Stadium on Tuesday.

He said Arsenal needed to get back to the quality that sees them sitting fourth in the Premier League.

“We have 62 points we earned (them) hard with quality games and that’s what we want to focus on, to get back to that quality,” Wenger said.