With three leg breaks already having happened thus far, three that are not actually Arsenal players, you would have thought that some action would have taken place. As the media clearly control plenty of what the Football Association do, I will hope that more outside influences such as the action taken by the Dutch coach can force the FA to do their jobs correctly

Can the FA continue to hide behind the trees with their hats pulled tightly on their heads in an attempt to hide their faces.

The FA, the media and the brain dead ex footballer pundits would have spewed the same line about Nigel de Jong being a good honest pro, who was attempting to go for the ball and these things happen in the good old English in ya face Premier League.

The trouble is, an outsider has now come out and indirectly got themselves involved in the debate. Dutch coach Bert van Marwijk has publicly condemned his own player and subsequently banned him from the Dutch squad.

“It was a wild and unnecessary offence. He went in much too hard. It is unfortunate, especially since he does not need to do it. The funny thing is that the referee did not even show a yellow card for it. Apparently, there are other standards (in England)

Meanwhile the Match of the day squad spend their Saturday evenings giggling and chuckling about Karl Henry’s aggressive and despicable assaults on Joey Barton. How I wish we had pundits and writers in the media having the balls to go against the grain and tell Mark Lawrenson that aggressive play should be taken seriously, not that they would be kept in the job for very long.

Arsene Wenger has been ridiculed and taken out of context when speaking out about dangerous tackles. Instead of actually arguing against his very well made point they (being the media and managers) decided to say that Arsene Wenger wants to stop tackling from the game. Anyone who actually listened to Arsene Wenger during his press conference could surely only agree with him.

Arsene left no room for error by stating that the spirit of the English game should remain, it makes it the best in the world but dangerous play needs to be stopped. Very simple really.

I was listening to the Times podcast a few weeks ago and Patrick Barclay was arguing against some Scouser who clearly has something against Arsene Wenger. Every time he has spoken about our manager, it is done in a very sneering and negative way. The same way that we have all become accustomed to these days. Barclay was siding with Wenger about fouling on goalkeepers shouldn’t be allowed and this guy who doesn’t deserve enough of my energy to find out his name, just couldn’t bring himself to admit that Wenger was correct just because he doesn’t like our manager.

With three leg breaks already having happened thus far, three that are not actually Arsenal players, you would have thought that some action would have taken place. As the media clearly control plenty of what the Football Association do, I will hope that more outside influences such as the action taken by the Dutch coach can force the FA to do their jobs correctly.

Bacary Sagna will miss the French game after a worthy red card from his ‘pal’ Florent Malouda. It looked full of intent from where I was watching, but it didn’t actually happen as Sky decided not to make a big deal of it. Essien’s studs into the ankle of Diaby looked nasty although slightly more difficult to gage the intent.

Both players will be missing the French match against Romania on Saturday.

In other news super Bobby Pires is back at Arsenal, well training at Arsenal in an attempt to get fit to move onto a new club when the situation arises. How we could have done with Robert Pires on Sunday. A big game player who knew when and where to be in the penalty box.

Hopefully his attitude and ability can rub off onto the younger players. That game against Villarreal at the Emirates was a really special night, one that I will not forget in a hurry. He got a bigger and more emotional reception than the great Thierry Henry. I think any thoughts of Pires ‘doing a Campbell’ can be nipped in the bud quick smart. We have a wealth of quality offensive and creative players to fit in a player who will soon be 37 years old.

Jack the boy Wilshere has been called up to the England under 21s and senior squads. I am hoping that there is some resemblance of a brain cell in the England set up and that he will only play for the under 21s and has been included in the senior squads to gain experience at that level. I can handle that, if the lad is over played then someone deserves some sort of punishment and I don’t mean fines, I mean pain.

I usually try and end my posts with some form of positivity and this afternoon will be no different. If we manage to get through this international week without another injury (I know, I know) then we could well face Birmingham City with everyone back apart from Van Persie, Vermaelen and Aaron Ramsey. Oh and Emmanuel Frimpong but you know what I mean.

Nicklas Bendtner has said that he is in the best shape of his life. He must know that he has some work to do to leap frog over the likes of Chamakh who have been impressive so far. Bendtner is almost the forgotten man this season but it would be unfair for us to forget his impressive goal tally when he returned last season.

18 games, 10 goals in all competitions. For those who are not good in the maths department, that is better than a goal every two games. Hold your nose folks because that is certainly nothing to be sniffed at.

What it brings us is options. Bendtner is the one player that we have who is hungry to score goals. He looks to attack spaces and attack the ball. He could have made a difference in recent games but anyway, time to move forward and hopefully Theo can continue from where he left off, the same most definitely should be said for Captain fantastic.

Who knows, this may actually be our chance to have a run of games without injury… ok, maybe not.

Back tomorrow.