Song should be available again after his suspension/injury, and Clichy should be back in the team following an unspecified injury problem. The injury Silvestre picked up against Plymouth will keep him out for a few weeks

So a new year of the Premier League begins with a home tie against Gary Megson’s Bolton. We’re currently on our longest unbeaten run of this season, the win against Portsmouth stretching it to a massive six matches, our last loss the three nil drubbing we took at the City of Manchester Stadium in November. We need to make it last quite a while if we’re to challenge Villa for fourth place. There’s not a team you’d expect us to have significant trouble against that we face for the next twelve games or so, but then we’re yet to a lose to a team that we expected to lose to this season and we’ve still managed to lose five. You really never know what’s going to happen with this Arsenal side, especially now we’ve lost Fabregas for the season. Every manager now looks at our defence and thinks they can get a result out of us. Last season we only conceded seven goals in our first seventeen games in all competitions. At the moment we look like conceding that per half. And only the midfield personnel has changed, not the defence.

We have to hope that Villa’s run of luck (not to say that their good position is purely down to luck, but they have been having decent fortune in recent weeks) ends soon and that we can win games against sides like Bolton in order to take advantage. They currently sit three points ahead of us and have a better goal difference now as well. Their captain Laursen is out for around four weeks with a knee problem, which will make a difference in their defence, and hopefully we’ll see them drop some points. But it comes down to us first to get a run of wins going, something this current side never really looks like doing.

Bolton have lost five of their last six games in the league and cup, and currently find themselves 11th in the table, only three points clear of the drop zone. They’re yet to draw a game on the road in the league this season, winning four and losing six of their away games. In all competitions, we’re looking for our sixth consecutive victory against Bolton. This is our twenty second meeting with Bolton under Wenger. The last time they won away at Arsenal was in February 1994 in the fourth round of the FA Cup. Since then we’ve won six and drawn four in all competitions at home against them.

Team News

Song should be available again after his suspension/injury, and Clichy should be back in the team following an unspecified injury problem. The injury Silvestre picked up against Plymouth will keep him out for a few weeks, and Gallas will be out for the same time with a hamstring problem. Toure and Denilson are available again after injury. Almunia will return in goal and Adebayor should replace Bendtner from the team that played in the FA Cup tie at the weekend. Toure will take Gallas’ place in defence and Denilson could come into the side in place of Ramsey.

Subs: Fabianski, Gibbs, Song, Ramsey, Wilshere, Vela, Bendtner.

Central defender Gary Cahill could be back in the squad after injury. Kevin Nolan and Gretar Steinsson are suspended. Gavin McCann returns to the team following a suspension.