The manager rarely criticises his players in public but he barely held back in his post match assessments this weekend.

It was with refreshing honesty that Wenger criticised his team after Saturday’s disappointing result and he will be hoping that the players are mature enough to respond with a more convincing performance tomorrow night:

“We were much better at Man City, we were much better at Manchester United than we were today that is for sure. Today we were not good enough, I don’t deny that. We've chosen the easy part of the game and not exposed them with our pace in behind. If you want to score goals you have to go behind the defenders. We choked a little bit and chose the easy part of the game.â€?

"Mentally it's a blow. It's a big disappointment because we know it was a very important game that we couldn't afford to lose and we perhaps under-estimated how difficult it would be for us here. We had more of the ball so they tried to stop us from playing. Sometimes they were on the fringe of the rules but that's part of the game."

The Wenger of last season would have attributed the result almost entirely to the timing of the international break and/or the negative approach of Sunderland. Instead he barely mentioned either factor and gave the reasons to the press, that he normally saves for behind closed doors. Saying that we ‘choked’ and ‘under-estimated’ the game are big criticisms for a football team but it is something that many fans may be pleased to hear.

There is a feeling that Wenger mollycoddles the squad but this public outburst will reassure fans that he still demands the best and is not afraid to slate his precious youngsters. We are assured that this team is maturing and the manager’s decision to criticise the squad in public demonstrates that he feels that they need less protection. Now he will hope they produce the positive reaction he has attempted to provoke against Liege tomorrow and Chelsea on Sunday.

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