During pre-season, I talked with many Gooners about the magical transfer window and the many Football Manager-esque hypothetical deals that they would make as an armchair-Arsene. The usual positions cropped up that many Gooners and the media have highlighted; a good centre back, a good defensive midfielder, a good striker. Pretty much a new spine to the team then? Vermaelen and Van Persie have injury issues so this didn't seem a bad strategy. With Fabregas gone and Song's issues long, a new central midfielder would be a good call too.

I had a louder siren in my head. These positions were obvious I thought, has no-one noticed the left back conundrum? Clichy was never the player he was a few seasons ago and had steadily gone downhill with moments of concentration madness transpiring in many matches since 'that game at Birmingham'. With him sold and prior to Santos' arrival, were we seriously going to rely on Kieran Gibbs to marshal the left rear quadrant for an entire season? In the final stages of the Champions League? In Manchester and West London? Any manager looking at a team boasting Sagna and Gibbs as the opposition fullbacks would instruct their players to put as much pressure down our left wing as possible; why bother working your way past Sagna when there's a new boy on the left?

Gibbs seems to be regressing at the same rate as Clichy did. Since breaking onto the Arsenal scene a few years ago and deputising admirably for Clichy during times of injury, this season it seems that he is not going to fit the bill, at least not yet. In recent years world football has become much more mobile and attacking in all positions. Fullbacks are made to be wingers and inside forwards, proper touchline-to-touchline overlapping wingbacks. The problem is, this can spell disaster on counter attacks, which Gibbs is learning this season in the most miserable way.

It seems this season that he has lost confidence in his touch, his composure; Sagna's goal line clearance in Dortmund stemming from a Gibbs error on the halfway line. In most games it takes him an entire 30-45 minutes to settle as the teams quite rightly focus the majority of their attacks down his side. This lack of confidence of course could be symptomatic of the loss of key players this year, a loss of confidence that can be seen throughout the team, but taking its toll on the youngest of the squad. His first half performances versus Swansea, Dortmund and Shrewsbury to name a few have been scary to say the least and this is a guy who one year ago was knocking on Ca$hley's international door. I don't think Ca$hley will be needing to answer that door any time soon...

With Santos providing another option we can only hope that the Brazilian international will offer some needed experience and cover in that area if the stuttering Gibbs fails to properly tick over this season. However, with Santos being described as the next Roberto Carlos, I have reservations on whether he'll be incredibly focused on the defensive side of his game...

With back-to-back wins we can only hope that confidence will breed, that Gibbs' definite attacking qualities can also be mirrored in some defensive qualities too and that Mertesacker, Vermaelen and Koscielny will progressively provide more rigidity to our back line than we've seen thus far. Hopefully Santos will also acclimatise quickly and provide Arsenal with world-class options in both fullback positions.

Because at the moment, it's not just our centre backs that have issues; they'll be having to deal with a lot more crosses originating from our left hand side than the right during these months.