Thomas Vermaelen has scored more league goals this season than Fernando Torres. The Belgian does love a goal and while his willingess to get on the end of crosses has drawn praise from Arsene Wenger, the manager wants to find the right balance between attack and defence.
In today’s Match Day Programme, Wenger says, “I like him to go forward on set-pieces but I don’t like that we are caught on the break. The first job of a centre back is to not concede goals.
“But he has a nose in the box to find a goal where it is needed and I must say he is a good finisher. He is the only one, along with Robin, who gets on the end of crosses with headers. When you see him head the ball you have hope that he will score because he really goes for it.”
Six goals this season makes him Arsenal’s joint third highest scorer, alongside Mikel Arteta, behind Robin van Persie and Theo Walcott.
Meanwhile, left back Andre Santos should have added to his tally against Wigan on Monday night, and his love of getting forward adds another dimension to our attack, but does leave us a bit exposed at the back.
Wenger is enjoying the Brazilian’s contributions but says that there’s little to choose between him and Kieran Gibbs.
“I like to have a battle because we had many injuries and now Gibbs is back. In the last game I still had a doubt that he was completely ready but it is still a battle there.
“In every game it is an interesting choice but that is part of being a big club as well. You want the fight.”
Concuss me with planks!
It does hurt that we are so vulnerable to the counter but our proper back four are lightening quick – I think we will be much less vulnerable next season. It’s good that Santos will have to fight with Gibbs for a place. I have a suspicion that he could get complacent otherwise. Same for Walcott too – I want to see Wenger start Ox on the right a few times so that Walcott will know that everytime he is on the pitch, he will have to give more than the occasional good performance to ensure he keeps his starting… Read more »
Tell that to Alex Song too Boss. We should be keeping clean sheets first, anything the defenders and defensive midfielders achieve aside that is a bonus.
Just seen the chavs team. So absolutely no excuses today.
why so negative before kick off?
OX in starting line up!¬
primo!
lets hope for a committed, and clever performance from our lads out there today.
and a bit of luck would do as well ^^
The verminator will score against chelsea today. I want 100 Likes and a comment from arseblog if this happens.
Love this guy
On todays game
1. Thank goodness for vanpersie’s shitty performance, maybe suitor teams will back of now and he will be doomed to stay with us forever.
2. Tap running dry For rvp perhaps??, plus his calmness infront of goal seems all but lost.
3. Gervinho should definetly start ahead of chambo. Kid’s got much to learn, but would do well with a cameo off the bench.
4. No stick for ramsey today, direct that to rvp, trust me he needs it.
5. Kos the boss.
With Sp*ds and “I am England Manager” and Co going down at Q.P.R, I think it sort of puts us in a very strong place for third……………Newcastle may seem to be level with us, (three points behind with a game in hand) but they next travel to Stamford Bridge host City and travel to the Goodison, so they are bound to drop points in all those games, and with Chelsea now effectively 4 behind us, two wins would really do the trick for us. Its no way in the bag by any means though, and while two more points would… Read more »