Theo Walcott says that “counteracting first pressure” was the key ingredient to Arsenal’s 2-0 victory against Bayern Munich on Tuesday night.

The Gunners boosted their hopes of progressing to the Champions League knockout stage after goals from Olivier Giroud and Mesut Ozil secured the win.

Arsene Wenger’s side were on the back foot for long stretches of the game, but Walcott says their ability to spring forward on the break proved decisive.

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“It was just one of those days when we had to be patient,” he said. “We knew we were not going to have a lot of the ball and we had to go at them on the counter-attack.

“You can’t just chase them - if you chase the ball you just get passed around and you are going to lose so much energy. There is no need to do that.

“You just have to bide your time. Once they lose the ball they pressure quite quickly. If you can counteract that first pressure you have a chance.

“We were getting at them while we could and dropping back while we had to and obviously the goals came at great stages.

“Everyone did their jobs really well and I have to say Petr in goal was fantastic and made a number of very, very important saves. Everyone worked really hard and deserved it.

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“There was a lot of pressure on us, we knew we couldn’t lose but a win was a massive ask. The confidence is just flowing through the team at the moment, you can see that.

“Results show that and if we continue this you never now where it is going to take us - we are looking really strong.”