Wenger: No Sanchez spat with teammates
Print Edition
REPORTS of a training ground bust-up between Chilean forward Alexis Sanchez and his Arsenal teammates are “completely false”, manager Arsene Wenger said yesterday.
“I’m not aware. Nothing happened. Nothing at all,” the Frenchman told reporters ahead of Arsenal’s UEFA Champions League last-16, second-leg match against Bayern Munich at the Emirates Stadium in London today.
“(The media reports are) completely false. But I understand that you have to fill the newspapers and we respect that,” added Wenger.
Reports in yesterday’s papers said Sanchez was dropped from the starting line-up for Saturday’s 1-3 English Premier League defeat at Liverpool after the 28-year-old allegedly rowed with the manager and teammates. Wenger brought on the Chilean at halftime with Arsenal, which is now out of the top four in the EPL, 0-2 down at Anfield.
“I explained after the game at Liverpool that I decided to go for a more direct option in the game and that’s what happened. That was the unique reason for my decision,” said Wenger of his tactics. “For the rest, his attitude... He is a committed player, sometimes with excessive behavior, but you have seen that many times in history in every squad.”
Responding to questions about Sanchez’s future at Arsenal, with mounting speculation that the player could leave at the end of the season in a big-money transfer, Wenger said it would be the club that decided.
“Alexis Sanchez has 15 months on his contract so the decision will depend completely on Arsenal football club, not anyone else,” he said, describing his relationship with the forward as “honest and normal like with every player”.
Sanchez, Arsenal’s top scorer with 17 league goals this season, trained with the rest of the players at London Colney yesterday and was photographed shaking Wenger’s hand.
Arsenal was trounced 1-5 by Bayern in the away leg and will have to produce the biggest second-leg comeback in an UCL knockout tie to avoid a seventh successive exit at the last-16 stage.
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