West Ham 1 Arsenal 3: Theo Walcott hails Gunners’ character

Theo Walcott praised Arsenal’s character after the Gunners came from behind to seal victory at West Ham United and move back to the top of the Premier League.

Following a goalless first half, Carlton Cole gave the home side the lead when he fired home after Wojciech Szczesny spilled a shot in the 46th minute.

But Arsene Wenger’s men fought back and Walcott equalised when his left-footed shot bobbled past Adrian, before the England international headed home substitute Lukas Podolski’s cross.

The guys showed great character to come back from that

Theo Walcott

And Podolski, who made his first appearance since August after recovering from a hamstring injury, then secured the points with a well-taken finish in the 79th minute.

“From our disappointing results in the last few games it’s nice to get a good positive away win,” Walcott told BT Sport.

“It’s great to be top but it’s going to be a very tough league this year, everyone is very tight, a lot of people are taking a lot of points off each other so we’ve just got to make sure we look after ourselves.

“I think we’ve been criticised of late for not scoring many goals

“When you go 1-0 down you need to have a positive reaction and all the guys reacted in a great way.

“I missed a chance in the first half I should have buried and I know because I set high standards for myself but you need to put those things out of your mind and luckily we managed to fight on.

“The guys showed great character to come back from that.”