LONDON -- Arsene Wenger claims that he hasn't seen a replay of the decision that Danny Welbeck was awarded a penalty for in Arsenal's 3-1 win over AC Milan, but promised to talk to the England forward if in fact he dived.
Welbeck went down without any contact late in the first half and then converted the spot kick himself to cancel out an opening goal from the visitors that had given them hope of overturning a 2-0 deficit from the first leg of the Europa League tie.
Granit Xhaka then killed off the tie in the second half before Welbeck added his second goal near the end as Arsenal advanced to the quarterfinals.
"I haven't seen it again. Do you want to accuse the English players to be divers?" Wenger told a news conference with a smile.
"There's two things, was a it a penalty or not? I don't know.
"The Italian players were not happy with it, I can understand that, because I don't really know what it was. After that, Danny took the penalty in a convincing way.
"I will watch it again and give you my honest feeling about it. I will give him my honest feeling about it as well, don't worry."
Wenger had said before last month's North London Derby against Tottenham that English players had become the "masters of diving" following several controversial incidents involving Dele Alli and Harry Kane. He also said diving must be removed from the game.
The penalty killed off any momentum Milan had gained with their goal but manager Gennaro Gattuso refused to blame Welbeck or referee Jonas Eriksson for the loss.
"I don't want to talk about the referee. I don't want any alibi," Gattuso said.
"A referee can make a mistake as well. We can't find any alibi or bad luck or anything else."
Asked if Welbeck's actions had hurt England's reputation for fair play, Gattuso added: "He's a striker, he has to do what he does. We can't use that as a reference for the entire English football. There's a great deal of fair play in England."
The win keeps alive Arsenal's hopes of qualifying for next season's Champions League, as a top-four finish in the Premier League looks out of reach. And Wenger admitted it was a much-needed result to get over the team's recent poor run of form.
"Certainly for the climate around the team it was a vital result for us tonight," Wenger said.
"Apart from that, we have targets as well now to finish as close as possible to the top four, and why not benefit from a miracle. But as well focus on the quarterfinal now."
Arsenal will find out their opponents in Friday's draw, with Wenger saying Spanish side Atletico Madrid would be the team to avoid.
"Maybe the team who is the biggest favourite is Atletico Madrid. But what I like doesn't matter too much because I have no influence on it, we have to wait for tomorrow and see how we get," he said.
"If we get Atletico Madrid we get Atletico Madrid, we have now some time to recover and prepare for it."