After a stuttering start to the season we have finally clicked into gear with big away wins over Hamburg and Manchester United. For these two massive performances I think one player needs to be singled out – Ashley Cole. To some it may only seem like a coincidence, but in the two games after Cole derided his former team-mates as being ‘featherweights’ who lack morale and respect they have played like the team that lit a path all the way to the Champions League final last season.

Outright criticism from a fellow player, and one who had once been a team-mate, must have fired up the youngsters Arsène Wenger has put so much faith in. Both wins were special, not just in their execution, but also as they should end any further suggestions that we are over-reliant on Thierry Henry.

Reading the excerpts from Cole’s book, serialised in The Times, has revealed nothing new. I had little intention of buying his book as I saw it as a way of Cole getting us to pay for his fine for talking to Chelsea. The pre-publication blurb promising to ‘reveal all’, has merely confirmed what I have suspected for some time now: most England internationals have a highly inflated sense of their own worth, and a complete disregard for what is important to football fans when it comes to penning these books.

It would be understandable for Arsenal fans to treat Cole’s book like the plague. But it appears to be getting the same treatment from his new ‘fans’ at Chelsea - although that was always going to be a limited market given that so few of them can actually read and the publishers had no plans to produce an audio version. As for the neutrals, judging by the football journalists’ reaction to the serialisation I can hardly see the publication troubling the best-sellers lists. It’s already being sold at half price on Amazon, so desperate are the retailers to shift some copies.

The other reason I’m thanking Cole is because we now have William Gallas as a result of his departure to Stamford Bridge. When asked in the Gooner’s end-of-season surveys which Chelsea player I’d most like to see at Arsenal my answer has always been the same: Gallas. For me the Frenchman has had as much to do with Chelsea’s recent success as any of their players, but his versatility and excellence across the back four made his acquisition one of the best pieces of transfer business we’ve ever done. Chelsea know they’ve lost a really good player. Why else would they have besmirched his character in the way they did? That David Dein and Wenger managed to offload Cole and get Gallas plus £5 million should be highly applauded.

But equally so should Cole’s desire to leave, because without it there would have been very little if any chance of acquiring a player we really needed. It might seem a little premature to say this, but Cole’s move may also end Chelsea’s recent run of success. They obviously think he’s the final piece in their puzzle to winning the Champions League, but we all know that players who leave Arsenal never go on to better things elsewhere. I thought that the ‘leaving Arsenal curse’ might finally have broken when Patrick Vieira went to Juventus. But even after ending the season with the most points in Serie A they not only lost the title but the previous year’s championship.

Marc Overmars and Manu Petit enjoyed no trophies during their time at Barca while Nicolas Anelka’s career has been one of abject mediocrity since his acrimonious departure. He picked up a Champions League winners medal during his short spell at Real Madrid, if memory serves me correctly, but for a player with so much promise that is very little to show. Sylvain Wiltord has enjoyed his time at Lyon, picking up a Championship winners medal every year but does winning Le Championat count as a major trophy? Not by my reckoning.

If the curse continues - resulting in Cole becoming an albatross over Stamford Bridge and their enjoying a trophyless season, then I think every Arsenal fan will have to join me in thanking Ashley for his contribution to a memorable season.