Wenger looks to improved home form for Arsenal Cup success

Arsene Wenger insists that Arsenal can transform their European home form against AS Roma to set up a place in the Champions League quarter-finals.

Wenger defended a sterile goalless draw away to Dutch club Ajax on Wednesday which, thanks to surprise heroics from Roma, set them fair for the last eight.

The Dutch and English giants now top Group B with six points each after Roma, without a point in three outings, rediscovered their form to beat Valencia 3-0.

Arsenal and Ajax will progress with home wins against Roma and Valencia respectively on March 11.

Wenger said he was frustrated at Ajax's "negative" tactics in holding Arsenal for the second time in just over a week with a goalless draw in Amsterdam.

Arsenal have now won just one of their past seven games in the Champions League, although they have also lost just one of them.

However, Valencia's shock defeat by Roma has still left Wenger's side in control of their own fate with two games remaining.

The best-case scenario is that they beat the Italians at Highbury in a fortnight's time and, if Ajax also win at home to Valencia, the English and Dutch sides would both be through.

But the question is how Arsenal play at Highbury where they have struggled with just one win in the past five there in Europe.

"Let's be positive and make our home record two wins out of six games by defeating Roma," Wenger declared.

"I'm very confident the team will go through and I'm a great believer that we'll then go very far in the Champions League.

"There are a lot of possibilities now, but nine points should be enough to go through. That makes the Roma game very big but we must just adopt the psychology of cup ties.

"We have another big match before that against Chelsea in the FA Cup, so there are two big cup games in three days facing us now."

Victory in Amsterdam would certainly have settled Arsenal's nerves, but it was soon apparent that the Dutch side were set upon picking up where they left off at Highbury eight days earlier - on the defensive.

With only Zlatan Ibrahimovic up front, they packed the midfield and tried to stifle Arsenal's counter-attacking strengths.

"Ajax were very cautious and concentrated on defence. We lacked the spark to open them up but they got the result they wanted," said Wenger.

"We want to play with style but we play 60 or 70 games in a season and so that is not always possible. We are used to creating chances but we were a bit frustrated.

"They have a tradition of playing at Ajax but they had very negative tactics in this game."