Arsene Wenger hailed Jack Wilshere as a ‘natural’ after the Hitchin midfielder gave an excellent performance as Arsenal beat Doncaster Rovers 1-0 at the Emirates on Wednesday evening.

Theo Walcott may have grabbed the goal after an accurate ball from Alexis Sanchez found him in the box before he lobbed Rovers keeper Ian Lawlor in the 24th minute.

But it was Wilshere’s powerful display against Darren Ferguson’s League One side that left many impressed as he allied power and positioning with creativity and vision in the heart of midfield.

Wenger tried to downplay Wilshere’s contribution but admitted the midfielder is a special talent, saying after the match: “You have to put the game into perspective. “It did not have the same level of intensity of a Premier League game. It’s important to build him up gradually.

“I wanted to leave Jack Wilshere on to give him 90 minutes. Overall it was an ideal game for him to gain confidence.

“We will see how he responds after the game, but normally he’s alright.

“For me he is available to play now. He needs intense games of 90 minutes. You can see that in his movement he’s natural.

“Everybody is looking at him because everyone expects him to come back to his best. I wish that as well.

“I don’t know when he will be ready for the Premier League. We go game-by-game. We have three games in a week – Monday, Thursday, Sunday.

“I will have to make decisions on how to balance the teams when we play next week.”

Wenger was full of praise for the visitors after the game admitted he was surprised at the quality of their play from the team 51 league places behind Arsenal.

He added: “Everybody is super-fit in the lower divisions. They came and gave us a hard time. They never showed any weakness. Mentally they kept going until the end.

“They shouldn’t be too concerned to stay in [League One]. They have enough to stay in the league for me.

“I believe that we started well and in the first 25 minutes we started well.

“Slowly we lost a bit of speed and cohesion and we lost our level. After that we did the job even if it wasn’t in the style that we wanted to play.