Niklas Bendtner

Who is a great striker? Is he a player who scores an amazing goal every 2/3 games? Is he the man who notches a tap-in every game? Or is he the man who rarely scores, but who does manage to hold the ball up, get a knock-on?

Niklas Bendtner, at Arsenal, really does split the fans & divide opinions like no other. Many of us Gooner’s have said he should not be wearing the shirt, others, such as me, have claimed the young Dane deserves more of an opportunity to prove himself.

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It was just last week, Arsenal Vs Burnley, Bendtner had so many opportunities to score, however, each and every one of those chances were missed. After this some supporters may have even called for Nick’s head! However, when it came to Tuesday night, Bendtner was chosen to start Vs Porto. Despite that amazing amount of chances missed, Nick had Arsenal in front within 15 minutes. He went on to score a hat-trick in the game. Now, Bendtner is not a striker known to be prolific, in fact, not many people seem to expect him to score at all. But here is quite a nice fact about him, in his last 5 games for Arsenal, he has scored 6 goals. Not to be laughed at considering his injuries this season.

Now, it could be said Bendtner won the game vs Porto, he didn’t of course, it was mainly Arshavin and Nasri providing brilliant assists. But what Bendtner did do, was to get into a striker’s position. For instance, Arshavin gets into a position behind the defence; Bendtner was on the six-yard box to finish. The ‘strikers instinct’ is supposedly a dying attribute in football, the ‘fox in the box’ who will pounce on a ‘keeper’s mistake, or who will get on the end of a cross. Bendtner, however, in the last two games has become a player who can play both outside the box, and also grab a tap-in from a way-ward cross.

Now we move onto quite a big factor in winning the Premier League. This is what I believe has held Arsenal back from winning trophies for 5 years. The thing which they have lacked is the ability to grind out results in a game where they have not performed well. This season, however, that has quite suddenly changed. Probably the best example of this is the game against Liverpool, earlier in this season. Arsenal played really poorly in the first half. Leading themselves to go into the 2^nd half 1-0 down. A half-time rant from Arsene Wenger, and a massively improved performance in the 2^nd half meant Arsenal went on to win 2-1. The next game Arsenal played Liverpool in, was a truly horrible game to watch,  both side’s pass’ were poor, the shots went off target, the quality of the football was not nice, but Arsenal prevailed and won 1-0. There have been a few games this year when Arsenal have managed to push past a poor performance, in order to get the full 3 points.

Another example was tonight, Arsenal 2 -1 Hull was the full-time score. Arshavin had opened the scoring after 14 minutes, however Sol Campbell conceded a penalty and Bullard converted, the score remained 1-1 at half-time. Hull went down to 10 men, so a defensive approach was not surprising. Arsenal had most of the ball during the game, and a whole host of chances to score, but failed miserably. It took most of the half just for Arsenal to get a shot on target, but when they did, they were really in their rhythm, in stoppage time, all 6 minutes of it, Denilson decided to have a go from range. Hull ‘keeper Boaz Myhill saved the shot, but spilled it into the path of Bendtner. This was another example of Arsenal pushing despite not playing their best football. Something which could be a major factor in whether or not Arsenal wins trophies this season.

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