This is the sulution

Almunia
Sagna - Gallas - Vermealen - Clichy
Walcott - Fabregas - Toure - Nasri
V.Persie - Arshavin

This will be next years starting line up. With HOPEFULLY Adebayor GONE and Toure in defensive midfield!!

wat bout rosicky and eduardo

wtf? Toure is not very good with the ball and should definately not play as a defensive midfielder, we already have Denilson that is far better than Flamini or Toure. Problem solved.

No Denilson.

And problem solved.

First of all, a comment to the author of this article. You are mentioning Patrick Vieira when you are talking about defensive midfielders. I think everyone keep forgetting that Vieira in fact was an offensive midfielder. That is way he paired much better with Petit and Gilberto than with Cesc.

And then a comment to Zeki. Do you mean that we should buy Yaya Toure, and place him in Central midfield? Or are you really suggesting that we play Kolo Toure up there? Wenger has commented on why he don't play Kolo Toure in central midfield. He just don't have the necessary stamina required to play in that position

Toulalan of Lyon and France anybody?! 25 years old and keeping Patrick Viera and Dolphin Head Diarra out of the national side...?! just a thought.

sign Hedwiges Maduro

Toulalan is the optimal solution.
Best player in lyon after benzema.
huge engine, tough lika a rock and a good passer of the ball.

Almunia
Sagna, Vermaelen, Gallas, Clichy
Toulalan
Fabregas, Rosicky
RVP Arshavin
Eduardo

Toulalan would be nice...hopefully a transfer works out for him and us.

Tilt - did you just say that Denilson is better than Flamini ??? We need to buy a good DM fact! Song is great extra cover in this position but shouldn't be first choice. Last season proved that who ever we put in that position, didnt quite make the grade.

sign cana as the all needed DM.sell senderos n adebayor n use the cash to bring home benzema as adebayor's replacement.bring tasci to stand in 4 gallas n let us roll to the long awaited success.

I don't think it is such a problem. It would be nice to add someone that could add a real edge to the team. I think Man U win a lot of games in the tunnel, and a major signing would do the same for us. I believe that our defensive weakness gives team hope and they rise when they play us.

However, I believe that we have the players, Song in the second half of the season was very good. I would be happy to give him until January to see how he fairs. The rest of the team is much stronger.

In addition, Djourou is a DM. He could slot in there. Either way I think Man City have forced the Hand of Arsenal to really push on, and I am very confident this year with the current squad.

COME ON THE GUNNERS

Almunia

Sanga Gallas Vermaelen Clichy

Song

Rosicky Cesc Arshavin

RVP Bendtner

Subs
Fabianski, Toure, Gibbs, Nasri, Wallcott, Eddy, Wilhsire

Thats some team.

@KIM - "I think everyone keep forgetting that Vieira in fact was an offensive midfielder. That is way he paired much better with Petit and Gilberto than with Cesc."

LMFAO. Muhahahahahahaha! Arf!

Paddy is one of the best ever Defensive Midfielders in the Premier League. Petit was a playmaker despite his start as a defender. Gilberto + Vieira = 2 Defensive Midfielders which is why we went all season unbeaten. Cesc played instead of Vieira ... not with him.

42121
Sagna Vermaelen Gallas Clichy
Denilson Song
Fabregas
Arshavin RVP
Eduardo

cana is a big gamble... hes decipline isnt the greatest.. i agree hes an absolute animal and just what we need blah blah but we do have a certain style of play and him being centre of the park might ruin are game... nevertheless id love 2 see him at arsenal..

but the person i want most is toulalan.. not yaya, or melo .. toulalan should fit to our style perfectly well.. SUPERB medfeilder and extremly talented and experienced...

vieira was a box-to-box player, which is what we need, the only time we used a dm was champions league when we played with 4-1-4-1 formation. we need someone with pace that can tackle and needs to be tenacious.

Wht about Veloso??????????

I would definitely go for Xabi Alonso, but I don't know if it may happen as Real madrid want him...

Wenger! spread the cash for Alonso and all your weaknesses problem will be solved.

We'll have a balanced team..

Keep it UP Gunners

Denilson all the way...watch him next season he will be unbelievable.

Nasri - Denilson - Cesc - Rosicky

-------------Arshavin

-------------Rvp/ Eddy

Denilson has been fantastic this season - that is a fact. What do you expect from a defensive midfielder? Tackles, interceptions and economic passing? Well, that is what you get with Denilson.

Wenger may well sign someone for that position, but I don't think he will.

MikeEEE, please explain to me how Alonso would add anything to solve our "problems" because he is the least defensive "defensive midfielder" in the league. he does not sit back, he can hardly tackle, he doesn't intercept and he attacks pretty much all the time. It is blind stupidity to want Alonso to come here and "solve" our defensive "problems" - which, by the way, do not exist because Denilson was brilliant last year.

We need Fabregas to help out a bit more, we need to drop Walcott from his wide position and Nasri/Arshavin/Rosicky need to track back more, just like Hleb/Rosicky/Ebouein the season before last.

Denilson has shown great potential and had a good first season but hasn't been helped by the indifferent form of his team mates. Defending and attacking are team duties and in this regard we haven't been our best. A new DM will be welcome but it is not essential.

http://arsenalcolumn.wordpress.com/2009/05/31/denilson-has-risen-from-the-shadows-to-take-centre-stage/

http://arsenalcolumn.wordpress.com/2009/03/07/denilson-can-rekindle-the-lost-art-of-midfield-tackling/

http://arsenalcolumn.wordpress.com/2009/06/04/a-season-in-review-%E2%80%93-the-defence/

@ MikeEEE: Also, I do hate the notion that Alonso is not defensive. He's a deep playmaker who control's his area very well, decent positionally, can tackle but people seem to expect too much of him and intercepts.

I've seen a lot of Liverpool live games too as I am studying coaching and Benitez's ideals are very interesting.

http://www.arsenal.vitalfootball.co.uk/article.asp?a=514757

am with the toulalan and Veloso idea, and get mexes (not sure Vermealen has the menality for english premier legue)

ruffkid, Veloso is terrible, Toulalan is nothing special and have you seen Vermaelen play football?

Why do people comment as if they know what they are talking about?

Alexander what !!!!!!!!!!!! i am egyptian and we play against cameroon many matches and i can tell u that this player is sucks just like his brother. he is not even that national player he is somekind of seminational player in cameroon that has a great national team but not as great as englad or brazil !!!!!!! and the evidence that proof that he is not a defensive minded player at all that i watched most of arsenal matches last season and i didn't see him making a single slidding tackle !!!

for me lorik cana could be the solution isa .

I know this is out there but what about Traore in the deeper midfield position alongside Fabregas. He has pace, strength, stamina and most importantly, at 6ft, height all attributes Fabregas lacks. Also being naturally left-footed he would bring balance to the team.
One problem though is his poor positional sense but this could be improved and his attacking tendencies but then again the oh so magnificent Flamini didn't always sit back and often joined in the attacks.
And for those who say we need someone aggressive like Cana only needs to remember this
http://www.metro.co.uk/sport/football/article.html?in_article_id=66567&in_page_id=43

i mean the list above dosnt mention better options we could have there,i went 4 CANA coz simply hes the best in that list,but thers couple of others we should try and get,i think we realii need 2 DM,1 just as a back up coz deno and song are nooowhere near ready yet,deno il be in few years bt nt song 4 me,i thnk hes better off been a CB as for diaby the Emirates Gates are wiiiide open 4 him bt dis sukrrrr knows he aint gna get a game 4 any of top half of the table in anyy strong league in Europe,dunno why people dnt mention SENNA???hes still TOP and should be cheap aswel no??so he il be good as the back up am talkn about,anywyz we MUST MUST MUST get YAYA or MELO as our 1st
DM next season,dnt give a monkey if they signed new contracs that dosnt mean they dnt have a price.SENNA,YAYA or MELO,SAKHO or HANGLEND in
Silvy,DIABYYY,SEndo,traore....while loan Deno,Song,Ramsey.KEEP ADE,ABOUEand the REST!!then we have a good balanced team!!!

Denilson has proven all season that he has what it takes and has actually performed better than he is given credit for. There is absolutely no jneed to sign a defensive midfielder and Arsenal fans really need to take a look at what we already have.

Try and think about games where he was really a weak link.

Our real weak links is our poor attacking ability, inability to create, poor finishing, lack of organisation at the back and only having Denilson as a defensive thinking player in the midfield (Fabregas, Nasri, Walcott and Arshavin need to contribute defensively and help him out occasionally)

Xabi alonso would be terrible for DM.
He wasnt good when given that responsibility for spain, its not his natural position. Hes a deep-lying playmaker like fabregas. We might as well play nasri there, at least he can tackle a bit. Also, we need someone to play 50 good games a season, he cant manage that.
Id stil like us to go after hitzlsperger, may sound hypocritical because hes not always played as a DM either, but thats not necessarily what we need. We need someone who will sit back a bit and who can tackle and intercept, plus his shot is a bonus. On top hes got proven PL experience as well as champions league and international experience, with 1 year left on his contract.
(Flamini wasn't a specialised DM)

Still, I wouldnt be surprised to see denilson looking 10times better next season, along with song who already showed massive improvements, so perhaps a new DM isnt necessary. Switching the formation to a more attacking 4-3-3 as many have suggested, rather than the 4-5-1 or 4-4-1-1, which only seems to work against the big teams, could work out well, as it spreads the defensive workload of the centre 3

"We need someone who will sit back a bit and who can tackle and intercept" - that is exactly what Denilson has been doing.

More interceptions than any other player in the league and pretty much the best tackling record in the league.

TT - true, but he has let himself down in other areas.
I think he's gonna be great.Some of his performances for arsenal have been exceptional but he never got the credit he deserved. Next year might even be the one. He just needs to bulk up a bit imo. He gets knocked off a little too often. And maybe improve his consistency.
The thing with him is, hes actually a really talented attacking player as well, so Im excited to see how he develops.
Sometimes u just got to trust wenger's judgement, because I dont know exactly how strong denilson is, or how far away he is from what he needs to be. Only the trainers can really know that. So whether we decide to sign a new DM or not, I'll trust their decision.
I really liked the look of song towards the end of the season as well. To be honest, having song and denilson in the centre made us a much more solid outfit. Id like to see us switch to a 4-3-3 with cesc, denil and song our starting CM three personally

"only having Denilson as a defensive thinking player in the midfield (Fabregas, Nasri, Walcott and Arshavin need to contribute defensively and help him out occasionally)"

I completely agree, except I would say nasri does do his job defensively, and fabregas puts in the effort.
But it seems we've gone from hard working box-to-box players like edu, vieira, gilberto, ljungberg, parlour etc etc, to having a midfield made up largely of attackers, and I think this was wenger's rationale for sticking with eboue at Rm for so long. IMO he should still be there for most games as walcott just doesn nothing defensively, and doesnt always offer enough in attack. Whereas at least with eboue you get the workrate and defensive cover..

Song was great when he was allowed to roam around with Denilson sitting back, he was poor whenever trusted as the lone DM.

But I think it is unfair to say that Denilson is easily pushed off the ball. I was 6ft "brute" Melo get pushed over by some South African players in the Confederations Cup - it happens to everyone. The problem with football fans is that we do not whatch other teams play, so we have nothing to compare with.

Arsenal fans are naturally sceptical at times, so if we don't like something, we just seem to stick with it. Eboue, Bendtner and Gallas are also examples of this, however well they do.

Or you could swap that round with Walcott and Toure being praised, even if they are playing like children.

I don't thinkw e will sign a DM, it is just the press picking up on the stupidity of pundits and Arsenal fans and linking us to players who they think we need.

When in reality, Wenger will be looking for Adebayor's replacement and possibly a new attacking midfielder, depending on Rosicky's fitness.

@ Davi - I agree that Nasri does help, but not all the time. And I also agree that Eboue should play there ahead of Walcott, but next season, it is likely that we will play a 4231/433 with Nasri, Arshavin and Rosicky/Walcott on the wings, with Fabregas helping out alongside Denilson.

As for Cesc helping out more - I have worked out using the Telegraph stats that Cesc tracked back and tackled more the season before last, alongside Flamini. It is like a 0.1% difference, but you would expect the lad to work more alongside the supposed "weaker" player.

TT - yes that's true. Fabregas' form obviously dropped this year, and based partly on his comments, it seemed that he was unhappy that his mates were allowed to leave and that we didnt replace them with big names.
That could be considered a fair complaint, but he should have been working just as hard, if not harder to make up for the loss and as u say help out the perceived weaker team mate. Instead his performances dropped, which I think is because his workrate dropped. So it was the strangest thing to me that we would make a player captain, when he had just shown that he was only willing to give his all when the conditions were absolutely right, rather than giving his all for the club regardless.
Maybe I'm being a little hard on him there, but it was still a strange decision to give him the captaincy imo. It looked to me to be appeasement. Also though there werent a vast number of candidates i guess. RVP is the only real "captain" material imo, but hes not on the pitch enough to be a worthwhile captain

Agree with Denilson will come good but we still need Cana for the time peroid in which Denilson grows into his role. His game vs Roma last year was outstanding and changed my opinion of him. You still need a player like Cana to destroy play, hold people accountable and let every other team in the EPL, you do not come into the Emirates and kick out your way to hopefully get a result. Cana is a captain and somewhat of a hero at OM, for good reason, he provides the steel and leadership that Arsenal lack. Someone said United win games in the tunnel, Cana provides that as well. Beleive me, the Arsenal do not want to see him in the tunnel at White Hart Lane.

Why does it have to be the defensive midfielder who striker fear into a team? Surely every player in the team as a collective should scare the opponent? Does Carrick scare anybody? I don't think so.

It's more lack of fear we need than intimidation. That is the trouble with having such a young team. Some of them, including denilson i have to say do look like they can be intimidated at times, which is a problem for the team, but will subside with matches.
It's players like rvp, eboue, nasri and more recently song, who are more likely to raise their game or be aggressive back at the opposition, and we need more of that kind of attitude.
Even flamini looked fairly timid when he first joined, nothing like the player we saw last year. It just comes with playing games and having to face up to these kinds of bullying tactics

Agree that it does not have to be the DM to strike fear in the oppossing side but in the past it has been Roy Keane, Viera types who were the enforcers in the middle of the park. You are right Carrick does not strike fear into the opposition but Vidic sure does. I thing the position tends to have these qualities that some clubs need, especially in the spine of the team, like us. We need to have that player that does not allow players getting there shots in on ours. Sorry but that is the reality of playing this game in this day and age. Cana provides all that and more. He is a guy you want to go to war with.

I agree these types of player are an asset, but I wouldnt say vidic is the type to strike fear into the opposition. He wins all his headers and doesnt back out of challenges, but he doesnt go over the top, doesnt try to "send a message". If anything ferdinand is more aggressive.
Its clear tho that whenever a team tries to get physical with man utd, the whole team reacts and puts in sliding tackles - fletcher, anderson, park, rooney, carrick, evra - none of them will go easy until the other team accepts that they wont beat man utd playing that way.
That's the sort of reaction arsenal needs to give, but its usually only one or two of our players who react like that, and they get crucified by the press for being over the top

my 1st choice is Gago, the best suit for arsenal & would fit us perfectly
if not, i wanna see either fletcher or carrick as defensive md at arsenal
yes yes, i'm not crazy we should try it the guys there really hate fergie
if not we should get 30-31 years old killer because we really have a current problem with df.mdf but i think 2 tears fron now song, diaby & denilson (in this order) will grow-up to be big killers so we dont really need some meol/veloso/cana & co ....

Wenger won't sign anyone in the midfield position.

- - - - - - - Almunia

Sagna - Gallas - Vermaelen - Clichy

- - - - - - - Denilson

- - - Fabregas - - Nasri

Rosicky - - van Persie - - Arshavin

Cana would be ideal, as would Toulalan. Cana is like a bigger Flamini while Toulalan is very similar to Flamni. Same stature but a better all round player imo.

So:
Al
Sagna Vermaelen Gallas Clichy
Toulalan
Cesc Rosicky
RVP Eduardo Arshavin

League champions there.

any1 here whos saying we dnt need a DM iz outa their mind,i mean how da fukn can u say that,we got ownnnned in that department by small teams(like stoke)for fuk sake!!and TT i just dnt get u man,u talk about DENO as if hez THE BEST DM in the world,get a grip man,hes defo better than song and diaby and will come good in few years bt until then if we depending on them DM'z we have ill bet anyyyyyythn will be out of the top 4 next WITHOUT a DOUBT,Garry murry spot on mate we need someone with the FUK OFF sign on his face,cnt have a team full of kids,mdgnts,very offencef and so on at 1 time,we were NEVER LIKE THAT BEFORE SO wHY NOW?????thats y we are a laughn stock now,until fukn wenger buyz decent,experince playerz AS EVRY FUKN TEAM DOSE then we are dooomed 4 years to come.

Denilson will rival Anderson as the best DM in the world in years to come. He is class.

Has anyone who voted for Cana actually seen him play besides his video on youtube which just shows mainly brutal tackles. Personally I think Veloso would be the best buy as he is ridiculously skilful and would fit perfectly into Arsenal's style of play.

AMZ

The capitalisation in your post does you justice. It shows you to be a complete muppet.

Thanks all for your suggested formations, but in my opinion, i think the team should look like this.
GK - Almunia
DF - Sagna Naldo Vermaelen Clichy
MF - Rosicky Cana Fabregas Arshavin
ST - V. Persie Pogrembyak
This team will terrorise any opposition.
Wenger can sell Adebayor (Pogrembyak), Gallas (Naldo), Senderos (Vermaelen) & Toure (Tasci) and Mikael Silvestre (Djourou). Nasri, Walcott, Bendtner, Eduardo, A. Song, Denilson, C. Vela, A. Ramsey, Wilshere, Traore and the rest should form the bulk of our FA and Carling Cup Team.
That's my opinion and i'm sure we'll have medals to show for it at the end of the season

We were "dominated" against Stoke? erm... I don't think so. What actually happened was Arsenal dropping Nasri, Walcott and van Persie with Song, Diaby and Bendtner coming in to add more height, when in reality, we needed quality because, apart from the two throw ins, we were totally dominant.

Why do people make out as if we deserve to lose against these teams as if they were literally "dominant" in the match?

If you think about it, there were hardly any matches where we deserved to lose, or were dominated by skill, or power. When all that happened was Arsenal failing to score and making a stupid mistake at the back, nothing to do with Denilson getting bullied by Joe Bloggs in the Stoke/Fulham/Hull midfield.

to be honest wenger knows what hes doin, so let the team grow, i agree we need a DM, but give denilson time and you will see what happens, no one gives him enough credit, as he is actually an offensive midfielder and hes adapted well under the circumstances. cana would be good, hes a destroyer, but MELO would have been better, due to his physical presence something which arsenal have lacked due to thier youth and inexperience. wait till rosicky and eduardo get back and RVP solves his injusy problems and arsenal will e competing for the title next season!!! i think this upcoming season will show what wenger has done with this new team that hes created since alll the members of the invincibles of 03/04 season have left, i think theyve reached a stage now where they are experienced enough and hungry for glory. players to get rid of are defintely eboue hes fukin useless, and maybe sell loan some fringe players like troare and ramsey to get some game time. ade not sur should he stay or should he go, hes got potential but i think the glamour has got to him a bit. COME ON U ARSENAL!!!!