The Arsenal Blog

Can Arsenal accommodate two big, powerful strikers in the squad? We might be able to find out, if Arsene Wenger reacts to the words of Christian Benteke. The Aston Villa and Belgium forward has hinted that he could leave his current club and has previously stated that his `dream` was to play for Arsenal.

He said, “If Aston Villa say I must stay, I won’t necessarily accept that.”

You could say that Olivier Giroud is not the typical Arsenal striker, at least under Arsene Wenger, but the manager seems to be very happy with the contribution Giroud has made this season and I’m sure he has looked on with admiration at the job Benteke has done for Paul Lambert at Villa.  ...........Read more

Arsenal may have lost their last two home games, but they are still very hot favourites at 4/11 (Stan James) to beat Aston Villa tomorrow, as their opponents are 20 points below them, and just one point away from relegation.

Despite their lowly position, Villa have managed to beat West Ham and draw with Everton in their last two games, so their price of 10/1 (from Bet365) could be extremely generous if Arsenal have totally lost their confidence. The draw is also highly priced by Bet365 at 9/2. Please remember that if you are going to open a bookies account you should check out BonusReferrerCode.com to find out which Sportsbooks give the best bonuses.  ...........Read more

Arsenal’s manager Arsene Wenger is getting unexpected support from Dutch defender Ron Vlaar, who is pushing Robin Van Persie to stay with the Gunners amidst rumours linking him to a possible move to the Italian champions Juventus.

After just signing with Aston Villa, Vlaar is now vehement in saying that Robin should stay with the Gunners, but admits that he has no certain information which can point to a possible stay.

“I talked to Robin and several other players during the Euros,” said Vlaar.  ...........Read more

Arsenal had very little problem extending their winning run to seven in a row when they disposed of Aston Villa 3-0 at the Emirates yesterday. The first goal came from the unlikely source of Kieran Gibbs and was swiftly followed by the second from Theo Walcott, but Arteta’s bullet-like freekick in the second half capped of an excellent performance by the whole team.

Wenger was understandably delighted after the match. He said: “I felt it was a very dynamic, fluent performance in the first half with top technical quality. It was a controlled performance in the second half, we controlled the game and managed not to concede a goal.  ...........Read more

Andrei Arshavin must have been devastated by the reaction of the Arsenal fans when he was brought on against Man Utd, which was compounded by the way he let Danny Welbeck walk past him to set up United’s winning goal.

His confidence was low before the incident but what will it be like now? So with the axiom that “If you fall off your bike, you have to get straight back on” then Wenger will surely have to try and restore his confidence by putting him back on the pitch quickly against Aston Villa this weekend.  ...........Read more

Arsenal’s Dutch striker Robin Van Persie is raring to go against Aston Villa and refuses to be rested in the attempt to break Alan Shearer’s record of 35 goals in one single year of Premiership football. The Dutchman has 33 goals so far in 2011 and needs another 4 to break the record, but only has 3 games to get them

“We are a team who wants to respond quickly now and keep our spirit and determination,” said Wenger. “Then we have a bright future, but it’s important that if we keep that spirit and determination we can go from strength to strength.  ...........Read more

The Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger thinks that his team have come a long way since the beginning of the season, and believes that the watching fans get value-for-money when they come to watch Arsenal’s attacking style in action.

He thinks that even in last weeks defeat to Man City the football was a joy to watch, and he expects more of the same against Aston Villa tonight. He also warned the Villa players to expect a backlash after the City defeat.  ...........Read more

Arsenal’s manager Arsene Wenger didn’t have good news ahead of the Aston Villa match as it seems that full-back Kieran Gibbs will be unavailable for a bit longer even though he was previously expected to come back before the weekend.

“Kieran Gibbs has unfortunately had a setback and he is not back yet,” Wenger told the club’s official website.

“It’s very disappointing because we had good hope that he would be back for tomorrow’s game, but he is not available.”

“Ryo is joining in normal training on Friday, so he is completely back from injury,” said Wenger.  ...........Read more