There are encouraging signs and even flashes of pure brilliance. Theo Walcott has come on signficantly since last season, and Samir Nasri is added bite to the attacking midfield section. And Vela is showing his capabilties as a substitute

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Despite a lacklustre start overall, Arsenal are still in for a chance at the title, but only if Arsene Wenger re-appraises his approach to transfers, teambuilding and tactics.

There are encouraging signs and even flashes of pure brilliance. Theo Walcott has come on signficantly since last season, and Samir Nasri is added bite to the attacking midfield section. And Vela is showing his capabilties as a substitute. Also encouraging is that Abu Diaby is finally fit, and adding a missing dimension to the midfield both in height, fluidity and presence.

Nevertheless, there have to be some signficant shifts in Wenger’s approach if Arsenal is to remain serious title challenges. Firstly, Wenger has to overcome his resistance to spend money during transfer periods. Secondly, there need to be signficant spending during the January transfer window if AFC is to keep up with, let alone catch the other members of the EPL top four. The current Arsenal squad is simply too thin in terms of personnel and experience. The absence of a defence midfielder and the need for more height and ball-winning presence among the back four is now a common analysis of Arsenal’s central shortcomings. And Almunia is just not in the same league as the likes of Petr Cech.

But it is Arsenal’s current strike force that we have inherent problems. Here we didn’t match the improvements in terms of personnel to the strike force of Manchester United and LIverpool, and the collective improvement of Chelsea’s range of goalscoring options. Adebayor and van Persie are not operating at the same level as their peers at the other top three clubs at present, and our backup strikeforce is too inexperienced too make a real difference in top-of-the-table clashes. The purchase of a striker of the calibre of Klas-Jan Huntelaar would have made a difference to Arsenal’s indifferent start. This omission must be rectified in the January transfer window.

Finally, Arsene Wenger must look for more creative aggression in his approach to all campaigns, but especially in EPL matches with the other top four teams. Arsenal needs at least two-thirds of the points available in these encounters to give added momentum to the challenge for the league title.