There were rumours of Mikel Arteta being ruled out due to injury or illness but those rumours have come from the world of Twitter so I will cast those aside until I hear anything official. With Francis Coquelin the latest Arsenal player to be struck down with injury, we have to hope that we do not pick up anymore midfield injuries as we are very short

We have been here before haven’t we? Two of our rivals slip up at home and drop crucial points when expected to grab all three. After our recent slip up against Fulham, three points would be valuable right now and on paper you would say that an away victory against a promoted side shouldn’t be a problem but that would be foolish and would ignore the Swans fantastic home record this season. In 10 games at the Liberty Stadium Swansea have lost only once to Manchester United, a game where they deserved at least a point. In those games including that defeat they have only shipped four goals which is the best in the league alongside Manchester City.

I hope more promoted teams copy the Swansea blueprint. Brendan Rodgers has clearly been reading a different coaching manual to Tony Pulis. His team are very good at keeping possession and building from the back and in former Chelsea wide player Scott Sinclair and Nathan Dyer on the opposite side they have real speed and a direct threat from the flanks.

Without any natural full backs in our side, it will be interesting to see how we deal with that. Ignasi Miquel hasn’t had much in the way of first team games at left back and Johan Djourou is just coming back after suspension.

The rest of the team pretty much picks itself. Many will be hoping to see Thierry Henry start alongside Robin van Persie but I don’t think that would be sensible given Henry’s limited game time so far. I think he will correctly be used as an impact substitute and the left sided starting position will go to Andrey Arshavin who looked lively against Leeds United without the required end product. Hopefully with more games under his belt, he can start to produce the type of end product that we saw consistently in his first half season at the club.

With much of the Swansea danger potentially coming from wide positions and our shortage of natural full backs I wonder how much of an influence Arshavin will have at both ends of the pitch.

There were rumours of Mikel Arteta being ruled out due to injury or illness but those rumours have come from the world of Twitter so I will cast those aside until I hear anything official. With Francis Coquelin the latest Arsenal player to be struck down with injury, we have to hope that we do not pick up anymore midfield injuries as we are very short in that department.

Emmanuel Frimpong is on loan while Jack Wilshere, Abou Diaby and the versatile Coquelin are all unavailable for the manager. We have to see if Per Mertesacker and Tomas Rosicky can come through their illness and take part in the squad as their positions are short of numbers right now. If Mertesacker is not available then Arsene may have little choice but to turn to out of favour Squillaci and partner him along with Laurent Koscielny. Judging by last season, that would not be the ideal choice.

Like most Gooners, I am looking forward to a cameo from Thierry Henry and potentially lining up alongside Robin van Persie in our front line but I guess much of that depends on the result and how the game is going. While I enjoyed the fairy tail return, I think I could do without having to send him on in search of a goal although if the result ends up the same way as it did against Leeds then I think I will take that now.

Ideally we will click offensively from the start and the Arshavin, van Persie and Walcott trio can blow Swansea apart before they can even get into the game. I have been critical of Andrey Arshavin for the most part this season but I hope he can build on what we last saw of him. What tends to happen when I feel this way after a good cameo is a poor performance so by pointing this out I am reversing the jinx or something.

Anyway, it is going to be a tough few weeks for us now so getting back to form today would be a great way to kick start our season.

Make it happen you lovely Gooners.

Mean Lean’s Predicted Line Up