LONDON -- Arsene Wenger told Theo Walcott that it is the time to stay with Arsenal after the forward fired them to FA Cup glory.
Walcott is out of contract in 2016 and his future is shrouded in speculation after a season when he only made four league starts, with talk he may look to leave to get more first-team football.
But, after scoring a hat trick against West Bromwich Albion last week, Wenger chose him against Aston Villa and saw the England international open the scoring in a 4-0 win.
And the Frenchman is confident Walcott will remain at Arsenal as he insisted the Emirates Stadium is the right place for him.
"I don't see why he should not be here next season," Wenger said in his postgame news conference. "He is a player who was out for a year, January to January and it took him a while to come back to his best and I think he is now at an age when it is very interesting.
"He has experience and is at his peak physically. It is the time to stay with us."
Wenger said he picked Walcott to expose Villa's lack of speed at the back, adding: "I thought the pace would be a problem for them. They play high and we had the combined pace of [Alexis] Sanchez and Walcott but it was for us to dominate the midfield and use our strikers. I knew if we were able to do that we would be dangerous."
Arsenal won the FA Cup for a record 12th time while Wenger's sixth triumph took him level with George Ramsay, Villa's manager from 1884 to 1926, as the most successful manager ever and he enjoyed both achievements.
"I am very proud of that," he said. "If it has not been done [since then], it shows it is not easy and all of us want to achieve things that are difficult. For the club it is great, we won it 12 times, more than any club. Personally I managed in seven finals and we won six.
"It was a convincing win. I never felt the focus or the quality dropped and overall it became comfortable for us."
The best goal of the afternoon belonged to Alexis Sanchez, who signed from Barcelona for £30 million last summer.
Five minutes after the break, the Chilean found the net from 25 yards off the underside of the bar.
"I've had limited opportunities [to play alongside him] but when I've been on the pitch with him me and him have linked up very well, he's a flash player, he's very talented," Walcott said of his teammate.
Wenger said an aim for next season is to regain the Premier League title, which he last won in 2004.
"I think of course we can push on," he said. "Why not? We have won the league in the past when we had the potential to do it and that is what we want to do again."
Wenger also confirmed Arsenal are not looking to buy Juventus' Chile international Arturo Vidal, saying: "We have good midfielders and at the moment we are not looking at Arturo Vidal."