Wenger quiet on Mourinho hand shake

Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger believes Chelsea counterpart Jose Mourinho must deal with the pressure that comes with starting their Premier League season poorly. He’ll be the best again.

Chelsea head into the televised clash in need of a kick-start to their Barclays Premier League campaign, which has seen the champions beaten three times already and down in 17th place.

Jose Mourinho coached side thrashed Israeli football club Maccabi Tel-Aviv 4-0 in the Champions League match on Wednesday, with the Spaniard scoring the third goal with a sublime volley.

The two men did not shake hands after Arsenal’s 1-0 victory against Chelsea in the Community Shield in August and Wenger did not want to reflect on whether they would shake hands this time around.

To do that Chelsea must do what proved too much for countless opponents over the last 10 years – get the ball past goalkeeper Petr Cech.

At Friday’s pre-match news conference Mourinho offered a vote of confidence to the Belgian, who has often seemed short of that quality this season. Because he’s on the bench for one game or I take him off at half-time, what’s the difference?’

Wenger, though, says he draws no schadenfreude from the issues facing his rival manager.

‘If we are looking at the table at the moment and we see where we are, and we know the distance we are from the top of the league, I don’t think that helps us.

“When you lose matches, you are affected”, he said.

“I don’t go in that direction [that Arsenal are title challengers]”. I think people are focused on what has happened on the pitch.

He said: “What you expect from these games is high intensity, full commitment and you want to prepare for that and play with full focus”.

“Somebody punched someone in dressing room, the manager doesn’t want to speak with this guy”.

The Arsenal boss insists that his focus is now only on his side’s performance tomorrow and he is not concerned about the rivalry with Mourinho.