Arsenal 0 Manchester United 0: Arsene Wenger admits Arsenal are 'short' in attack but still claims his side 'should have won' following stalemate at the Emirates

Avoiding defeat seemed to be the priority for both teams in a game that failed to come up to expectations

Nemanja Vidic and Patrice Evra combine to deny Oliver Giroud connecting to a cross (AP)

Arsene Wenger claims Arsenal “should have won” last night’s game against Manchester United, but conceded his side created few chances at the Emirates.

In a game billed as one that neither side could afford to lose, that appeared to be the most important thing on the agenda with a lack of menace in the final third for both teams.

Wenger, who was widely urged to sign a new striker in the January transfer window, admits that his side are missing something up front.

“We are a bit short of goals at the moment," the Arsenal manager said. "Mathematically we have lost goalscorers like [Theo] Walcott and [Aaron] Ramsey [to injury]. In games like this you see that. We will get back by, first, not losing tonight and then, coming back to our normal offensive level."

Explaining why his side did not show the kind of form that propelled them to the top of the Premier League after 20 of the 26 match rounds this season, Wenger said: "I felt we were nervous, yes.

"It is not worrying because we care about what we do and when you concede five goals like we did on Saturday … we are only human beings and that is always what you get after a game like that.

"Sometimes you don't score because the team was highly focused not to concede. That maybe restricted our game going forward a little bit because we were certainly hit by the five goals we conceded on Saturday. You could feel that here. When you are hit like we were, the players want not to lose it and we could have lost it in the last five minutes."

Despite losing their grip on the top position in the table, due to poor results for Chelsea and Manchester City in recent games, the Gunners remain well in the mix.

"We have come out of two difficult games and we are still in a strong position," Wenger said. "That is the only positive. We had two bad results but we are still in a position where we can do it. We lost two points here and we missed an opportunity to go top of the league again, but a point keeps us in the race.

"We've had difficult games, Liverpool and Man United and, from now on, it is important we come back to winning. If you look at the domination we had, then yes we should have won, but Man United restricted us to very few chances and the few we had, we couldn't take. On top of that, they had players who can be dangerous on the counter."

Wenger will now prepare his side for an FA Cup tie with Liverpool and a Champions League game against Bayern Munich before an easier looking run of league fixtures that includes Sunderland, Stoke City and Swansea.