Aaron Ramsey and Tomas Rosicky are back off the treatment table and are included in the squad. Mikel Arteta and Alex Song are certain starters  so it will be down to Wenger to decide who from Ramsey and Rosicky is the best suited for this game. My money is on Ramsey after the Welshman’s fantastic first half at Ewood park. I have fallen head over heals in love with Francis Coquelin after his energetic performance against Shrewsbury so I hope he makes the bench but he will have strong competition

After hitting the canvas and being out for the count at Ewood park last weekend, our victory over Shrewsbury with the youngsters will hopefully give our first team a much needed second wind. The end of the match left us all distraught and furious having witnessed how we managed to shoot ourselves in the knee caps once more. After having spent the first half point the gun straight at the opposition. I still remember how I felt at half time, a feeling of satisfaction that we have finally found our game and rhythm again and that is what I have to cling onto. We have missed fluidity in our game for some time so it was nice to finally see it in action again even if it was only for 45 minutes.

The players will have been working on that all week seeing as many from the Carling Cup will not be involved in the game, at least from the kick off so you would expect plenty of defensive work as well as continuing to work on our pass and move game.

Opposition

Bolton Wanderers are currently second from bottom in the table and even with the worlds saviour Gary Cahill in their ranks they are shipping goals. 13 to be precise. One less than ourselves so that should give our front line a bit of hope that they can be breached as I am sure they are currently thinking about our defence right now.

I suspect the injury to Chung-Yong Lee as well as Daniel Sturridge returning back to Chelsea has hit the Lancashire club.

I am interested to see how Gary Cahill tries to handle Robin van Persie and I am also very intrigued with the Kevin Davies vs Per Mertesacker battle. Bolton will be aiming for Davies as often as possible, especially after watching the Blackburn game. Davies is very good in the air so 6ft 6in Mertesacker will have his work cut out. While our German is a massive player physically, he is not the most aggressive. The opposite can be said of the Bolton forward.

Goalkeeper and Defence

The only real selection issue for Arsene is who to play at left back. We do not yet know who Arsene’s first choice left back is right now, especially as Gibbs scored in midweek and gained more confidence as the game went on. Andre Santos looked short of match fitness at Ewood park but would have had the week to work on that. I expect Laurent Koscielny to partner Per Mertesacker in central defence, while a spot on the bench could be available for youngster Ignasi Miquel. Bacary Sagna will also return to the team after limping off against Blackburn last week which is a massive plus.

Midfield

Aaron Ramsey and Tomas Rosicky are back off the treatment table and are included in the squad. Mikel Arteta and Alex Song are certain starters  so it will be down to Wenger to decide who from Ramsey and Rosicky is the best suited for this game. My money is on Ramsey after the Welshman’s fantastic first half at Ewood park. I have fallen head over heals in love with Francis Coquelin after his energetic display against Shrewsbury so I hope he makes the bench but he will have strong competition from Emmanuel Frimpong who is another top quality young midfielder.

Attack

Arsene has pretty much everyone fit in the attacking area, so some players are likely to miss out on a place on the bench, let alone the first team. Gervinho, Arshavin, Walcott, van Persie, Chamakh, Park, Chamberlain are all fighting for three places in the team. While Andrey Arshavin is fighting for a starting spot, it seems as if Wenger’s preferred choice is currently van Persie with his two speedsters Gervinho and Walcott out wide making runs off the Dutchman.

Injuries

Johan Djourou has a slight hamstring strain and will miss the game along with Yossi Benayoun who also picked up a muscular injury.

Injured list:

Abou Diaby, Thomas Vermaelen, Jack Wilshere, Yossi Benayoun, Johan Djourou

Mean Lean’s Predicted Line Up

It is important that we manage to find the form that we produced in the first half at Blackburn and it is equally important if not more that we avoid making the errors that we made in the second half.

Offensively we are pretty much at full strength apart from a massive Jack Wilshere sized hole in the attacking midfield position. Apart from that we cannot really complain and it is time that we find our pass and move game over a run of games and not just for sections in certain games.

I am hoping that the team use the pain of last weekend to give them that extra fight from the very first whistle. We clicked into our rhythm nice and early against Blackburn and we will be wanting to do the same again against Bolton.

Come on you Gunners.