Joe Fitzpatrick 
Arsenal are on a fantastic run of form at the moment and have won games that no-one could have predicted that they would win, especially when you consider the nature of their capitulations against Milan in the San Siro and Sunderland at the stadium of sh**e a few days later.
We didn't just lose those two games; we completely gave up. We capitulated. The lack of effort was blatantly obvious and the fact that professional footballers on £50,000 a week were getting the basics so badly wrong was infuriating to any Arsenal fan who has ever played a competitive game of football in his life. When you dedicate a lot of your time and money to watching the players of Arsenal F.C. every week, there is a minimum amount of effort and professionalism that you come to expect from your heroes in Red and White.
They are living your dream. You would give anything to trade places with them and, even though you know deep inside your heart that you simply weren’t good enough to play for Arsenal, you also know that, if you did play for Arsenal, you would run yourself into the ground and hate yourself to death if you cost your team a goal through some kind of stupid mistake. Then you'd go and run some more.
The reason that most Arsenal fans have a lot of time for Yossi Benayoun rather than, let’s say, Denilson or Arshavin for example, is because Benayoun puts himself about and looks like he is exerting himself, whereas Denilson and Arshavin certainly do not. Denilson doesn't break a sweat and Arshavin is just plain unfit (for a professional athlete, you understand, not to be confused with your average fitness levels of the average bloke smoking outside the pub).
You could see Arshavin hunched over and puffing away after 30 minutes jogging or after a long sprint over 35 yards. He was lucky the TV cameras didn't make that much more out of it, because they could have really embarrassed him with a montage of him looking completely out of breath and knackered all the bleeding time. At least it might have made him run a bit more, though. The little Russian obviously has more skill in his big toe than I have in my two feet, but when I watched his runs over 90 minutes I felt that, as relatively lazy and unfit as I am when compared to most professional footballers, I convinced myself that at 27 years of age, and with a decent BMI ratio, I could keep up with him during a one-off game. You shouldn't be able to even think like that about a supposedly top-level professional athlete, but you'd fancy your chances against Arshavin because he doesn't look as though he is trying most of the time, and, even when he does, he looks absolutely shagged out.
Theo Walcott might not be anywhere near to Arshavin in terms of dribbling skill and passing ability, but even the most deluded of fans like me know that Walcott would murder them for stamina as well as pace - as so he should, if he wants £85,000 a week for running around after a leather ball full of air.
People in the media are wondering how Wenger has turned it all around, whereas some Arsenal fans are wondering why he took so long to do anything about the lack of effort shown by some of his players. Some credit must go to Arsène Wenger for the fine recent run of form that his team are currently on, because, quite frankly, no-one could have seen it coming. It's much better late than never, I suppose. For example, Rosicky used to be the epitome of a once-great athlete simply going through the motions. He reminded me of a faded Roy Jones Jr, if not quite a badly-faded Muhammad Ali. During the 8-2 defeat at Old Trafford, Rosicky was little more than a spectator, and he really didn't seem all that bothered about it either. He couldn't even be bothered to look around as the opposition’s goals were pouring in to his net left, right, left, right, left, right and centre. Then there was another goal and he probably didn't see that one either.
Fast forward to the 7-1 demolition job on Blackburn Rovers, and he looks like he really wants it and he starts putting in man-of-the-match performances "on the regular" (as we like to say in Holloway). The contrast between now and then is simply unbelievable, and he has been one of our most consistent performers during our current purple patch. What changed? Well, for me it's pretty obvious that he is simply running his heart out for the team and contesting a lot more challenges in the middle of the park, therefore fighting for and earning the "right to play", not unlike Xavi, Iniesta and Fabregas do. The first touch and the class were always there for any casual observer of the game to see, but the physical effort was lacking. Maybe I'm wrong, maybe it was the aftermath of the injuries, but it's a bit suspicious that he didn't put in this much effort when deployed as a winger (much the same as Arshavin didn't) but is now happy as Larry when he's deployed as a central playmaker. Weird how he perked up when it was contract renewal time too, eh? No, I'm being too cynical. The poor little lamb just didn't want to be a winger. I can just imagine him and Arshavin like screaming little brats just now.... "No, Uncle Arsène! We're not wingers! We're central midfielders! Whahh! Whahh! It's snot fair! Whaaahh! Why does he always get a turn and not me!! You don't love me. I hate you."
Now little super-Tom is happy and flying high and hey, who knows? Maybe if Arshavin had been given Ramsey's "Fabregas role" at the beginning of the season with the Welshman as his understudy, we would have all been singing the praises of a resurgent Russian instead of the newly-revitalised and sprightly bouncing Czech, mate.
They say that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Marouane Chamakh must be the reaction to Rosicky’s action, then. When Chamakh first arrived, he was racing around making a nuisance of himself and getting the odd goal or assist. Once van Persie took the main striker role ahead of him, the Moroccan too seemed to "do an Arshavin" and threw his toys out of the pram while gobbing out his dummy. Since he lost his guaranteed spot in the team, he stopped trying and is just content to pick up his wages until he can force a move back to France. You do not break Champions League goal-scoring records by being completely lacking in any sort of footballing ability. If you did, I would be the all-time legend.
Another player who has really improved over the last few games is Theo Walcott and, as if completely by coincidence, his contract is also running down. It always seems as if somebody's contract is running down at Arsenal, doesn't it? The problem for Theo is that it is now sink-or-swim time and he knows it. The Ox is breathing down his neck, Gervinho might just be starting to adapt to the English game, and Ryo Miyachi looks to be an exciting prospect. If the rumours are to be believed, and Wenger is really chasing any combination of Hazard, Götze and Podolski, whilst still retaining the services of Robin van Persie, then Walcott knows that he'd better improve his all-round game if he wants to start for Arsenal. It makes you wonder how much more he would have improved if he had been made to serve as an understudy to a winger of the class of Pires, Ljungberg or Overmars. The lad seems to be really responding well to competition for his Arsenal shirt and has done well to overcome a lot of harsh criticism because, in my opinion, he was always too young, raw and one-dimensional for a place in the Arsenal starting-eleven. Let's hope he continues to develop and finds that extra gear more consistently.
There you have it; lazy players kept out of the first eleven? Check. Competition for places? Check. Giving the team a final ultimatum to start pulling their weight or feel the swinging axe? I think so. Wenger was staring at the very realistic possibility of not winning his fourth-place trophy for the first time in 15 years, and I think something snapped inside of him and the rose-tinted specs finally came off. Let's hope that he continues to keep his side from showing any of the previous mental weakness and can now go from strength to mental strength.
Credit to Arsène for a fine run of victories, but I would love to ask him why he thinks that Vermaelen has now managed more goals than Chamakh and Park combined, and also why he decided to play Ramsey ahead of the Ox or Gervinho against Everton? Kind of makes you wonder if it sometimes takes him too long to change his pecking order? What do you think? A great series of wins, but we are not out of the woods yet and it is going to take more of the tenacity of will displayed against Everton as well as the cutting-edge displayed against Tottenham, Milan, Blackburn and Liverpool.
Wenger said it best himself when he said "I always feel that the vibes have to come out from the team. If the vibes coming out from the team are right, the crowd will follow and support us. So let’s focus on us being right because the crowd feels that. We believe they have to trust us on that." "We will bounce back and I think it starts from us being determined, from us being united, from us trusting each other and us playing the football we want to play. Let’s focus on that quality. We had 20 shots on goal at Blackburn, let’s continue to play our game." Let's make some noise for the boys against Aston Villa on Saturday and hope that we will see more dynamic, pressing and action-packed displays from this revitalised Arsenal team.
Oh to be a Gooner.
