Wenger: We lacked sharpness

Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger has claimed that his side lacked sharpness after they played out a draw against Marseille in their Group F encounter.

On fire striker Robin van Persie was given a rest and started the game from the bench, with Park Chu Young taking his place in the starting line up. However, Wenger believes that this was a gamble that did not pay off.

"It was a gamble that you can say tonight did not come off," Wenger said to Sky Sports

"He was very tired after the game on Saturday so we planned to rest him and make him come on later.

"He had the chance though - so if he scores that then it looks like perfect play - but overall we did not create enough."

However, Wenger had words of praise for his defenders, after the reintroduction of Thomas Vermaelen to the first team resulted in a clean sheet.

"I felt tonight that we defended very well. It is good that we didn't concede tonight because it was very difficult to score in the second half because Marseille were very strong physically.

"We lacked a bit of sharpness you could see after Saturday's game - we had not got it out of our systems.

"We tried very hard but we lacked some quality in the final third to finish off our chances.

"We had a few in the first half; Aaron Ramsey had two and Robin had the very good one in the second half as well.

"Overall, we took four points from our two games with Marseille so now we want to win the Dortmund game - we are still in a strong position."