LONDON -- Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger has vowed to "fight back" after the team's 5-1 loss to Bayern Munich ramped up criticism against the Frenchman, and insisted that defeat won't make it harder to keep star striker Alexis Sanchez at the club.
Wenger is facing increasing calls to step down this summer when his contract expires, while the futures of Sanchez and Mesut Ozil are also in major doubt.
Both players have yet to sign a contract extension, and the embarrassing loss in Munich caused thousands of Chilean fans to sign up to a Facebook campaign asking Sanchez to leave the club.
Sanchez has often shown his frustration openly after bad results for the Gunners this season, but when asked if the loss to Bayern would make it more difficult to convince him to stay, Wenger flatly said: "No."
And he even appeared to criticise the forward when a reporter pointed out that he was one of the few Arsenal players who played well on the night.
"Uh, watch the game again," Wenger said, but refused to elaborate on whether he thought Sanchez had also been poor. "I do not want to comment individually, but I think we have lost as a team and Alexis is part of that as well."
Wenger himself stayed defiant in the face of all the criticism at his news conference on Friday, saying he would continue managing next season -- either at Arsenal or somewhere else. And while he admitted the drubbing in Germany certainly hurt, it hasn't knocked the Frenchman into submission.
"Every defeat is hard. I can never transmit to you my feeling, certainly, on defeats," he said. "When you hate defeat like I hate defeat it's always tough. But as well I'm determined to always fight back."
Wenger said that competitive nature was already evident as a child, and recollected how "I threw up" after suffering his first-ever defeat as a manager at the age of 33. More than 30 years later, that taste of defeat isn't getting any easier to swallow.
"I'm a competitor, I'm born like that, I don't know why," he said. "When I spoke with my neighbour at six or seven, he said to me already I could compete for everything. So I was born like that. And when I lose games, of course it's difficult to take."