After a less than inspiring, narrow victory over Bolton at home on Saturday we can all take comfort in the fact that at least we got all three points. Every win now, as ugly as any of them maybe, is vital if we are to keep pace with the whippersnappers from Villa Park and maintain our place in the Champions League next season. Besides eventually grabbing maximum points, there were five real positives I took from the match:-

1. Bendtner scored the winner:
Following the infamous booing of Eboue during the home game versus Wigan, Bendtner has come in for much of the same treatment. I must admit to being continually frustrated by his lack of goals and for such a big guy, would expect him to offer a much more physical presence up front. The wasteful finishing during the Carling Cup loss at Burnley was the real moment of his downfall for many fans. As disappointed as I have been with Nicklas this season (it would seem that he’s just not top class, albeit a solid striker) I have yet to openly voice my annoyance during matches at Ashburton Grove. Some fellow Gooners were unable to act in a similarly supportive manner and openly jeered his every touch, in between blaming him for everything going wrong on the pitch for the entire team. Slowly helping to completely destroy the self-confidence of a young forward being forced to play out on the right. When RVP floated over his cross, who else would it be but Bendtner to smash home the winner? It will take far more to convince us that the Dane is the answer up front for Arsenal but it definitely jammed the jeers of the so-called fans back down their throats.

2. Toure wore the armband:
Following a much publicised bust-up with William Gallas, Toure recently handed in a transfer request and, as far as the newspapers were concerned, was off to benefit from the Abu Dhabi riches at Man City. Wenger has since come out and confirmed that Kolo subsequently withdrew his somewhat hasty request and is going nowhere, thank God! Although the centre back has not been in his finest form this season, and his partnership with Gallas in the team is questionable at best, Toure is an Arsenal man through and through; I would hate to see him leave. He gave a highly committed captain’s performance on Saturday, and let’s not forget he’s one of very few players in the squad who knows what it is like to triumph in the Premier League title race. Hopefully having him lead the team out against Bolton will remind him and us where he belongs.

3. Jaaskelainen’s time wasting failed again:
Once again the most blatant time-waster in the Premier League was foiled again, as his pathetic attempts to keep the scores level and allow his team to escape with a point proved fruitless. Every time the Bolton keeper plays at the Grove, he continually takes an age over every kick, questions every decision and takes extreme pleasure in riling the home support. The fact that every season we manage to smash a goal past him and then get to watch him scamper about, hurrying up every kick, is a joy to behold. An absolutely superb shot-stopper on his day, but these tactics coupled with his team’s completely negative, non-football tactics frustrate Gooners to extreme levels and make him appear to be a total w**ker!

4. Our full backs excelled again:
Without doubt we have the best full back pairing in the league. Clichy is a far more complete than Ashley Cole ever was during his time at the club and Sagna has proven to be a fantastic signing. Both players can defend well against any opponent, both can bomb forward whenever needed to link up the forward play or whip in a cross and, most importantly, their work-rate and commitment is second to none. Clichy has a slight advantage in his non-stop running at an electric pace, for the entire ninety minutes but the last ditch challenges (and overhead goal line clearances!) made by Sagna have been absolutely outstanding. Their excellence was there for all to see once again on Saturday.

5. Everyone in the stadium was as cold as me:
With this being our third home match at the weekend in a row (Eh? Fourth! – Ed) I had already experienced the ‘joy’ of freezing my nads off behind the goal at the north end twice recently and was not relishing such another occasion. Lo and behold it was even colder than those previous matchdays and me and my mate Luke were both cursing the low temperature barely a few minutes after the kick-off. By half time it seemed all Gooners in the lower tier around us were bobbing up and down, trying in vain to stay warm. During the second half this led to all of us standing up, jumping up, singing and generally providing more atmosphere than at any other home match this season (the visit of Manchester United aside). Hopefully this spurred the team on to grind out a result and was definitely a throwback to many happy days / nights at Highbury. Maybe we’ve now found an answer to the lack of noise at our ‘new’ stadium – it’s temperature related!

The team continues to struggle for real form and our title challenge appears to be all but over, but I am trying to take as any positives out of every game as I can. They are definitely there if you look for them, after all we are Arsenal… and it could be far worse, we could be in the bottom three!