Arsenal Manager Arsene Wenger

Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger was unable to celebrate his side's vital 3-1 win at Stoke after teenager Aaron Ramsey suffered an horrific injury.

Ramsey was injured in the second half in a tackle with Ryan Shawcross, who was sent off and left the pitch in tears after seeing the extent of Ramsey's injury.

"I'm proud of our game because it was an unbelievable battle from the first minute. We needed to be tough and resilient to win," Wenger said.

"I'm very proud and of course very sad because of what happened. We know it's a bad injury. We have to transfer him to London tonight to see if he needs emergency surgery.

"We don't know how long he will be out but it's certainly long term.

"I'm not very happy with the tackle. We know what we are expecting, a battle everywhere, but we have now lost three players on horrendous tackles and I refuse to believe it's always coincidence.

"I don't believe it when you are hit as many times as we are. I just believe in what I see and when you see a player getting injured like that it's not acceptable. Commitment is right, but that is not right.

"All the questions I get in press conferences about we don't fancy the physical side of it, that's the result."

The game was level at 1-1 when the incident occurred but Arsenal somehow regrouped and scored a late penalty through Cesc Fabregas and an injury-time third from Thomas Vermaelen.

"We could see the team was shocked but this team is very strong mentally and we will do it for Ramsey as well because he deserves it," Wenger added.

Wenger said: "I didn't see many bad tackles in the game but this one was horrendous.

"To lose a player of that quality at 19 years of age when he is just starting his career is just horrendous. It is difficult to accept.

"It is the third player we have lost on tackles that are not acceptable - (Abou) Diaby, Eduardo and Ramsey today.

"I am just shocked because that is not football for me. It is not what I like in the game.

"If you have to live with that I refuse to do that.

"For a boy at 19 years old to be kicked out of a game like that, it is beyond words. I cannot even enjoy the win tonight. The players are shocked, it is a bad fracture."

Fabregas himself added "In five years I've seen three of them, Abou (Diaby), Eduardo and now Aaron. What can I say. It's difficult.

"You could say we are not protected enough. We are sometimes victims. I'm not complaining, football is like that.

"There are things that are a little too much but three times in five years is a little bit too much."

As for the rest of the game, Fabregas added: "We learned from when it happened to Eduardo, we lost a lead that day.

"It's very difficult to stand up but we showed character and knew if we won today we still had a lot to say (in the title race)."