Soccer

Flying Arsenal thump Ludogrets

Arsenal's Theo Walcott (left) and Ludogorets' Jose Palomino battle for the ball during the UEFA Champions League match at the Emirates Stadium, London 
Arsenal's Theo Walcott (left) and Ludogorets' Jose Palomino battle for the ball during the UEFA Champions League match at the Emirates Stadium, London  Arsenal's Theo Walcott (left) and Ludogorets' Jose Palomino battle for the ball during the UEFA Champions League match at the Emirates Stadium, London 

CHAMPIONS LEAGUE Group A: Arsenal 6 Ludogorets 0

IN-FORM forward Theo Walcott admits "the whole team is flying at the moment" after Arsenal secured a seventh straight win with a thumping 6-0 victory over Ludogorets in the Champions League.

Walcott scored his eighth goal of the season but it was Mesut Ozil who stole the headlines against the Bulgarians with the first hat-trick of his professional career. Alexis Sanchez and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain got the other goals.

"Obviously the goals are fantastic but we always say we want to keep a clean sheet, that's always our first goal, and we managed to do that," Walcott told BT Sport 3.

"We know how well we are going forward and it was all about sorting ourselves out at the back and we've managed to do that this season.

"The performances are coming.

"They started the game very strongly and technically they have got a lot of very good players and the scoreline may suggest it was quite easy but it was far from easy. So we can be proud of that and look forward to the weekend now.

"We always want to take our chances and today we managed to take pretty much all of them.

"Everyone was very focused and ruthless and it's a great result going into the weekend. The whole team is flying with confidence at the moment."

Walcott is keen for the Gunners to top Group A but knows they face some tricky games.

"Obviously the past is the past, we need to focus on the now," he added.

"We can't be looking too far ahead, we will focus on our recovery now and then Middlesbrough and when we cross that bridge we've still got a lot to do, a couple of tough away games, but who knows?

"We would obviously like to be in that strong position, finishing top, but we need to keep performing to reach our goal."