Walcott's performance in Arsenal's 7-5 win in the Capital One Cup drew praise from Wenger, but may still not be enough to secure him a starting berth against Manchester United on Saturday.
"I don't know yet," Wenger said when asked whether Walcott would be able to recover from playing 120 minutes in midweek. "I will see how he recovers."
Walcott has made no secret of his belief that he sees his future as a central striker rather than as a wide forward, a stance that earned him a mild rebuke from his manager, who said such matters were better discussed "in private than public".
But there are signs that, with Olivier Giroud having made a difficult start to his Arsenal career, Gervinho out of action for three weeks with an ankle injury sustained against Queens Park Rangers last weekend and Marouane Chamakh out of favour despite scoring twice against Reading, Wenger is prepared to give Walcott an extended run in the centre.
"I have always said it is important that he plays in the right position, and that certainly would be through the middle in the future," Wenger said. "He showed that again on Tuesday night. The positions on the flanks are changing; you need to do a lot of defending.
"He should be dedicated more to offensive work. He has good pace, makes excellent, intelligent runs, and what has changed with Theo is he's become a very good finisher."
He added: "In our team, we have freedom of movement. Nobody is handcuffed. When we have the ball, we have a lot of freedom to move. Theo has learnt a lot about that."
Arsenal have confirmed they will play a pre-season friendly in Jakarta, Indonesia next summer. The match will be part of a third successive summer tour of Asia.
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