Tony Pulis believes Arsene Wenger wants to carry on managing for another ‘five or six’ years and would probably prefer to be carried out of Arsenal in a box.

The West Brom manager, who has enjoyed something of a frosty relationship with his Arsenal counterpart since his days at Stoke, was full of praise for Wenger. It didn’t seem to be the usual platitudes that you get from managers when they are grilled by the press, Pulis’s words seemed to ave a lot of thought behind them which was perhaps the most surprising aspect of it all.

“I get the feeling that Arsene most probably wants to be carried out in a box still managing a football club because that is the way he is,” said Pulis before his side pulled Arsenal’s pants down at the Hawthornes on Saturday.

“He is football nuts. I really do think people at Arsenal have given him total trust. He will go down in history as the greatest Arsenal manager and I think he wants to manage for another five or six years by the sounds of it. 

“I think he is a great manager and he has been fantastic. If you go back from when he started right through to a period of time where now people are complaining they haven’t won the championship for a period of time and that just get to a certain stage in Europe.

“He is still managing one of great teams in Europe and they could finish in the top four and win the FA Cup. That would be a real tail-off!”

Hear what he had to say after the game in the video below: