Arsene Wenger dismisses Jose Mourinho's jibe that Arsenal have bought their way into Premier League title race

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Arsene Wenger has issued a passionate defence of his transfer policy following Jose Mourinho's claims Arsenal have bought their way into the title race.

The Chelsea manager said Arsenal's heavy spending on players such as Alexis Sanchez, Mesut Ozil and Petr Cech have made the Gunners genuine title contenders.

Mourinho is no stranger to publicly irking Wenger; famously branding the Frenchman a 'voyeur' and 'specialist in failure' in recent years.

And the Portuguese's comments have been viewed as an early attempt to apply pressure on Arsenal ahead of the new season. 

Arsene Wenger has dismissed Jose Mourinho's jibe that Arsenal have bought their way into the title race

Mourinho is trying to ramp up the pressure on Arsenal ahead of the new season

However, Wenger has dismissed the Special One's claims; insisting the Gunners have not been reliant on their chequebook.

'If you want to create success - which we want desperately - you focus on what happens inside, just try to do as well as we can and believe in the football we want to play and let other people talk,' said the Arsenal manager.

'We spend when we think we have to spend and do not listen too much to what people think or say. 

'We just try to make the right decisions. When you have the money available, we spend it. When we don't have it, we don't spend the money we haven't got.

'I believe that one day, if you make real statistics of the players we have developed here, and you compare them to all the other clubs, you would be surprised.

'We have more desire to do well rather than the pressure. We want to do well and want to enjoy to play together. 

Petr Cech joined Arsenal from Chelsea in a £10m deal this summer and played in the Emirates Cup

Alexis Sanchez joined Arsenal in a £30m deal last summer and hit the ground running in England

'You must not listen too much to what people say because sometimes, in the same week, I get two different reproaches.

'One is that I don't spend too much and another is I spend too much.'

Wenger's response to Mourinho's comments should add spice to Sunday's Community Shield clash against the Blues at Wembley.

The season curtain-raiser often provides an early indicator of how each team are shaping up ahead of the new season.

Mesut Ozil, seen doing a flick in training, joined Arsenal from Real Madrid in 2013 in a £42.5million deal

And Wenger admits his side expect to be genuine Barclays Premier League contenders. 

'Is this Arsenal's best chance of winning the Premier League for years? Yes,' concluded Wenger.

'You cannot say that we finished third in the league and that we have no chance at all. The desire is to improve and move up there to fight for the championship.

'We know many teams will also be in that position so let's start well and try to give our best.

'If I didn't think that then it would mean we were standing still. We want to improve, the difficulty for us is always to know how much.

'We know we will be better and we work very hard to be better. It's difficult to know how much better our opponents will be because everybody tries to be better.' 

Arsenal held an open training session at the Emirates on Tuesday ahead of the new season

Arsenal continued their preparations for Sunday's Community Shield against Chelsea at Wembley

Meanwhile, Wenger insists Calum Chambers will not be made available for loan, despite interest from former club Southampton.

'I would not consider a loan, not at the moment,' confirmed the Frenchman.

'I think it's important that I want to develop him as a centre-back. At the moment we have just the right number. He will get games here.'

Danny Welbeck (knee), David Ospina (fitness) and Alexis Sanchez (holiday) will miss Sunday's clash.