Arsène Wenger expressed his pride last night after watching an Arsenal side with an average age of 22 beat Fenerbahçe 5-2 to move closer to the Champions League knockout stages.

Arsenal require one more victory from three matches, which should come when the Turkish side visit the Emirates Stadium in the return match in a fortnight, to qualify from group G after recording their biggest away win in Europe since a 5-1 victory over Inter Milan five years ago.

Wenger drew most satisfaction from his players showing no fear in the intimidating Sükrü Saracoglu stadium. Theo Walcott scored his sixth goal of the season 70 seconds after Emmanuel Adebayor had given Arsenal the lead, the others coming from Abou Diaby, Alexandre Song and Aaron Ramsey — the 17-year-old’s first goal for the club.

“I’m very proud of the team,” Wenger said. “Our average age was 22 years old and we came here and tried to dictate the game in a very heated atmosphere. We tried to play and I’m very proud of that. I hope people love to watch us and we give them some good moments if they love football. They have no fear, that’s very pleasing. We go everywhere and try to play. We started strong, we continued strong and finished strong.”

Wenger highlighted the contributions of Diaby, who was outstanding in a link role between midfield and attack, and Ramsey, who made an immediate impact after coming off the bench, but the manager was also grateful for a superb performance from Manuel Almunia in goal to atone for some poor defending.

“I believe Diaby can play in between midfield and the strikers,” Wenger said. “He has good penetration. It’s the first game he has played in three months and he has done remarkably well. Ramsey’s only 17 and it’s fantastic to see him come on and want the ball. He has a presence straight away and it’s very good to see.

“I believe the goals were down to the fact that two teams threw everything forward. It was a very open game with two teams going forward 100 per cent. Fenerbahçe on the attacking side are very dangerous, but our pace, technique and movement made the difference.”

Arsenal can take great pride in ending Fenerbahçe’s 15-match unbeaten home Champions League run, though under Luis Aragonés the Turkish team look a shadow of the side that reached last season’s quarter-finals.

“It is a very difficult place to come, the fans get behind them, but we all got our jobs right tonight and it was just a brilliant performance by everyone,” Walcott said. “Everyone is flying. We’re playing brilliant football and scoring plenty of goals from all sorts of positions. People are coming off the bench and scoring goals and it just shows how strong our squad is.”