Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger says lack of first-team opportunities is the reason why he let Lukas Podolski join Internazionale.
Questions have been raised after the Frenchman failed to give the Germany international a proper run in the first team and despite saying the 29-year-old is quality, Wenger opted to loan him out to the former Serie A champions.
"He didn't get enough opportunities to play - because I knew that, I gave him a chance to go," Wenger explained.
"Why? Because we have many players who can play in these positions and at the end of the day only 11 can start.
"When a player of his quality doesn't get enough games, at some stage too much competition is detrimental to the confidence of the players and their positivity.
"You need the right number and we had too many players in this area. It's nothing to do with his quality; it's just down to the fact that we had too many players in the same area."
Meanwhile, the Arsenal manager gave a full update on who the Gunners might sign during the January transfer window, ruling out a new signing in the offensive department despite the departure of Podolski.
"We are not on the case [for Loic Perrin and] we are not on the case [for Gabriel Paulista], we keep all that as quiet as possible," the 65-year-old revealed.
"He [Krystian Bielik] is a young boy that we follow, yes. You see I gave you some information! We are not very close at the moment [to an agreement].
"Petr Cech is at Chelsea. We have three goalkeepers who for me are top class and there is a big competition going on. I have no doubt we have the needed quality.
"We are [also] not on the case [for Isco]. We have plenty of creative players. We are more short on the defensive side of our game, not on the offensive side.
"We have plenty of offensive players. We just spoke about Podolski who just went out, we spoke about Sanogo going out because we have so many offensive players that they don't get a chance to play.
"So we won't buy someone else in the attack."
