Arsenal: The season starts now

Arsenal rolled back the years on Saturday as they destroyed Southampton. It was a great team display to gain a solid three points and talk of winning the title has emerged. Within the space of two weeks however we face Montpellier away, City away and Chelsea at home. Let’s make it through these few matches and then see what position we are in.

Before saying all of that I would like to point out that the Southampton match cannot be over-looked. It showed the signs of a real football team gelling, and barring the Szczesny mishap, we almost looked faultless. Yet in all fairness to our opponents, Southampton were most definitely not in their top form and for most of the 90 minutes were very fragile at the back.

When I looked at our bench it showed a type of depth that had not been present in previous seasons. Thinking that we had Walcott, Ramsey, Giroud, Arshavin, Koscielny and Santos fit and ready to come on, and Rosicky, Diaby, Wilshere etc coming back from injury, it really does look like we have a squad that could last the distance. But have they been properly put under the microscope yet?

I’m not going to lie, I feel scarily confident going into our next few games, but is that confidence going to come back and bite me on the backside? We struggled against City last season and somehow managed to overcome Chelsea with Van P@?!*e magic, but let’s forget about those matches won by the unfaithful devil. We have changed the focus of our game. Last year, too often were we centred around getting the ball to Van Promisedhelovesarsenal. This season, it is quite clear that the goals are being shared around, and the team is playing more as a … well … team.

One thing I am a bit nervous about is our lack of an out-and-out striker. We could see that Wenger has noticed this and attempted to rectify this problem by playing Gervinho as the central striker (which did work), but Podolski to me looks really good out on the left, leaving us with only Giroud. It is obvious that Giroud has what it takes to score. His movement in and around the box is excellent and his aerial presence is outstanding. But I just wonder if he is going to fit into our style of play. I am not fully aware of how Montpellier utilised Giroud (Youtube videos don’t count), but I wonder if he will adapt to our style and if so, how quickly. That is something that will be key to our next few games and eventually, our whole season.

It has to be said that we do look good this year, but before we get too excited, let’s make it through the next few weeks. These are the tests that are going to split a title winning team from fourth place side.

Article by Josh Ben Moshe

Calling all Arsenal fans: Do you agree with Josh? Do you believe the Gunners still need to prove themselves against the likes of City and Chelsea before they can be truly considered as title challengers, or are Arsenal looking back to their best? Whatever your view, we'd love to hear from you.

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