Wenger confident Gunners can storm

Arsene Wenger has insisted that Arsenal's Champions League showdown

with Liverpool remains wide open, despite his side's failure to grasp their chances to establish a

first-leg lead to take to Anfield.

Dirk Kuyt's equaliser, brilliantly created by Steven Gerrard, cancelled out an Emmanuel Adebayor

header at The Emirates and ensured Liverpool will kick off next Tuesday's second leg as

marginal favourites to progress to the last four.

But Wenger believes the number of chances his side created on Wednesday evening augured

well for their chances of performing an encore to their famous second-round win over AC Milan in

the San Siro.

"I cannot fault our display," the Frenchman said. "In a game like that you don't create 20 chances,

you create four or five and we had four or five while they took the one they had.

"To finish a game like that 1-1 is disappointing. But we produced the performance we wanted

and we had the chances to win the game. Liverpool created very little and the whole second half

played in their half."

As well as the frustration at missed opportunities, Arsenal were left nursing a justifiable grievance

over the referee's failure to award a second-half penalty when Kuyt unbalanced Alexander Hleb

with a tug from behind as the midfielder wriggled into space deep in the box.

"It was a blatant penalty just under the eyes of the referee," Wenger complained. "That is a few

times that has happened to us now and it is very difficult to accept."

Predictably, his counterpart Rafael Benitez did not see the penalty in such clear cut terms.

"I watched the replay and I think it is not clear," said the Spaniard. "In England it is not a penalty."

The one thing that the managers did agree on was the significance of the run from Gerrard that

carried the England midfielder past three Arsenal players before he sent in the cross for Kuyt to

equalise three minutes after Adebayor's opener.

"Credit to Gerrard - he showed a touch of class on that goal," Wenger admitted, while Benitez

admitted that his side's evening may have evolved very differently without the intervention of

their captain.

"Arsenal are a very good team and when you concede a goal and you cannot score soon it

becomes very difficult," Benitez said. "It was really important for us to score so fast."

Benitez knows how rare it is for teams to come to Anfield and win when the old stadium is

bursting at the seams with fans used to feasting on European glory. But he also recognises the

threat posed by Arsenal's quality on the counter-attack.

"They can score in any stadium," Benitez said. "When we play at Anfield with our supporters it

makes a massive difference but we will have to defend very well and be very careful about the

counters.

"An away goal is always important in the Champions League. We know that if we can score it will

be more difficult for them and if you need to play extra time it will be harder for them because we

are at home."

Before the second leg, the two sides must play each other in the league, here on Saturday, and

Wenger believes the physical impact of that encounter will have a role to play next Tuesday.

"It is a little bit of a survival battle," he said. "The one that lasts out the best to the third game is

the better team."(source:yahoo/afp)