There was some good news for Arsenal from the current international break, most notably from the fact that no more injury problems have cropped up to affect the first team players available to Arsene Wenger for the rest of the Premier League matches.
However, the final round of international games have not done anything to ease the very serious concerns that many Arsenal fans have about our forwards and their chances of scoring the goals that Arsenal need to keep up the unlikely hunt for the EPL title.
A few Arsenal strikers were in action for their national sides but Alexis Sanchez, Joel Campbell, Olivier Giroud and Theo Walcott all drew a blank and I was really hoping that these games might just provide a goal or two and a much needed boost to the confidence of our struggling strikers.
Giroud did score a good goal for France last week and I thought he would have earned another start against Russia but instead Deschamps left him on the bench and only brought him on at the end when all four of their goals had been scored. Walcott was also a sub for England in their defeat by Holland and he did show a few flashes of form in his half hour of play but not enough to suggest he is about to hit form for the Gunners.
Most worrying for me is that Alexis Sanchez did not score for Chile despite playing the full 90 minutes in a comfortable 4-1 win over Venezuela and you could say the same for Campbell in Costa Rica’s 3-0 win over Jamaica. So is it down to Danny Welbeck, who should be nice and fresh after not playing for England yesterday?