Arsène Wenger has recommended that José Mourinho check the “real statistics” if he wants to scrutinise Arsenal’s transfer policy, citing his record of developing young players and adding that he does not think it worth listening to the Chelsea manager.

Wenger was responding to Mourinho's comments about the amount of money that Arsenal have spent trying to build a team capable of challenging for the Premier League title. Mourinho, beginning his annual campaign to get under Wenger's skin even earlier than normal this season, had cited the acquisitions of Alexis Sánchez, Mesut Özil, Calum Chambers and Mathieu Debuchy as evidence that Arsenal were not as careful with their money as many people believe.

That drew a withering response from Wenger as he looked ahead to Sunday’s meeting of the two clubs in the Community Shield. “I believe that one day, if you make real statistics of the players we have developed here, and you compare them to all the other clubs, you would be surprised,” he said.

Create success

“If you want to create success the best way is to focus on what happens inside, believe in the football we want to play and play it as well as we can, and let other people talk.

“You must not listen too much to what people say because sometimes in the same week I get two different reproaches. One is that I don’t spend too much and another is I spend too much. We do not listen too much to what people think or say. We just try to make the right decisions.”

Wenger has made only one signing in the close-season, with Petr Cech joining the club from Chelsea for a fee of just under £11 million (€15.5 million), and the Arsenal manager used Eden Hazard to make his point that the team from Stamford Bridge were actually the league's big spenders. Wenger explained that he had tried to beat Chelsea to the Belgian's signing when he was playing for Lille. Asked how close it was, he said: "A few millions."

Wenger also said that he still believes Cech can become an even better goalkeeper in Arsenal’s colours than he was for the club where he won the Champions League. “Petr Cech was already at the top but he will still improve. He’s at the stage of his career – 33 to 37 – where a goalkeeper can be at his peak. He has the desire. As long as you have the right attitude you can always improve in life.”

Bridge the gap

In turn, Wenger believes that will help his team to bridge the gap with Chelsea and make a sustained title challenge.

“We want to improve but the difficulty for us is to know how much we have to improve. We know we will be better and we are working very hard to be better. It’s difficult, though, to know how much better our opponents will be because everybody tries to be better.

“Let’s not forget that Chelsea won the championship with a comfortable distance so we have to make our way up. There was still a gap between them and the others. Manchester City, Manchester United and Liverpool have all made big efforts in the market and it’s very difficult at the moment to speculate on these teams.”

Chambers has been linked with a possible loan move to his former club, Southampton, but Wenger said the defender would not be leaving. “They didn’t try to get him back on loan. And I would not consider it; not at the moment. I want to develop him as a centre-back.” Guardian Service