Wenger back on gardener leave
ground, Wenger wants easy access to the dressing room before the game and at half-time to deliver his team talk.
He also plans use first-team coach Jens Lehmann as his mouthpiece to communicate with assistant Steve Bould in the technical area.
Wenger is likely to sit in the middle tier of the East Stand, where Chelsea are set to lay on stewards, while Arsenal are expected to bring their own security.
“I can still do the pre-match in the dressing room and at half-time,” said Wenger. “After the game it’s less important. But I could miss nearly one half if it takes too much time to get to and from my seat.”
Once more he is in the stands after being given a three-match touchline ban and fined £40,000 for his abusive language in the referee’s changing room at West Brom on New Year’s Eve.
The first of those matches was Sunday’s 4-2 loss at Nottingham Forest in the FA Cup and after making wholesale changes, Wenger to will revert to his strongest side in order to keep Arsenal in the tie ahead of the second leg at the Emirates in a fortnight. “I play the team who has a good chance to win, that’s what I did on Sunday, but of course we did not have the performance that I expected,” said Wenger. “The problem all came from the fact that we had three games in six days and we had many players on the edge.
“Some of them, even today, I’m not sure will be usable. We had so many injuries I had no other option but to rest players and find a compromise that could beat Nottingham Forest. When it doesn’t work, it backfires. We take the criticism on board. Of course we want to respond in a positive way.
“We killed an opportunity to win a trophy on Sunday and we have another one now and of course it is important.
“It’s a different game, it’s a semi-final against a big team. Psychologically the whole context will be different. We are not a team who can sit in our own half and wait for the 90 minutes, we are a team who have to go forward. We have not to forget that it’s part of our strength as well.”
Alexis Sanchez and Mesut Ozil, who are refusing to sign new contracts and could leave this month, are set to start.
Manchester City are pushing to sign Sanchez while the Chilean forward, just like Germany playmaker Ozil, is free to talk to foreign clubs directly.
Wenger claims that would not prove a distraction, saying: “It’s not a big concern because I believe most of the players today want to play in the Premier League and the Premier League clubs can pay contracts and wages that no other club – apart from three or four clubs abroad – can pay. “Overall not my concern.” Wenger also revealed that he fears losing out to Premier League leaders City in the £25million battle to sign West Brom defender Jonny Evans.
“At the moment, things are very quiet,” he said. that is main