Our Future Strike Force?

I've been doing some thinking lately about who will be our regular strike force in five years or so. Now, obviously I think we can all envision Adebayor leaving us at some point in the next few years, and judging by his antics over the summer I wouldn't be surprised if during summer next he is off to some "superpower" club such as Barcelona or Milan. Also, I worry about Van Perise and Eduardo. Hopefully Eduardo returns as good as he was before his injury but I just have this horrible niggling feeling that it may take him a year or two to return to his best. Van Persie is constantly injured and must be considered a treat to have. He, like Rosicky, will likely be someone who we almost forget about because of constant injuries but when he plays every once in a while will be good.

So, let's assume for the purposes of this argument that it is the bginning of the 2010-11 season. The World Cup has just ended, Adebayor is gone, and Arsene Wenger is starting the last year of his contract. I believe that Walcott by then will be a regular in the English national side and he will have had a spectacular World Cup despite the English team falling out in the quarterfinals. So, we'll be left with Eduardo, who is past his prime and may have been sold, Van Persie, who missed the World Cup because of injury and may have been sold as well due to unreliability of playing time. This leaves us with three main strikers (not counting the young back-ups we will have bought or produced from the youth academy by then).

The strikers are Bendtner, Walcott, and Carlos Vela. After watching the Carling Cup game last night I am truly excited by this. I believe the our three strikers will rotate depending on the team we're facing and fatigue. Vela will be like our current Eduado in his cool and calm finishes. He'll use his fancy Mexican footwork to beat player after player before finishing with ease. Then comes Walcott. He will race by players with his blinding speed and be very Henry-esque. The new no.14 will act just like the famous one. His speed will allow him to get in behind defenders, and after beating them he will finish with a trademark curling shot around the keeper in a fashion eerily reminiscent of Thierry Henry. Finally, we'll have Bendtner, who'll be just like Adebayor is today but better. He'll be the target of our aerial balls (crosses most likely, or perhaps a long ball as Plan B), he'll be strong, agile, able to beat player on the basis of both skill and strength. He'll then finish just as Ade does now and will be the perfect pairing for either Vela or Walcott.

Assuming this is the future of Arsenal's strike force, I believe it will be one of the most potent in the history of the Arsenal football club, and perhaps the history of English football itself. Vela and Walcott will be unstoppable and will rip defenses apart, scoring 15-20 goals each, and Bendtner will be the target man who scores 20-25 goals a season just like Drogba and Adebayor do due to sheer fox-in-the-box finishing and neat one-two's with his strike partner. Do the math and as a whole we'll be getting 50+ goals a season from our strikers alone, never mind midfield. Add in goals from there and we will be an unstoppable attacking force. It won't matter how many goals we concede, we'll just score 2 or 3 more.

The future is bright, and there should be nothing but optimism from Arsenal supporters right now. When our youth side beats a team 6-0 and Carlos Vela scores a hat-trick to open his scoring accounts, you know the future is one to look forward too. Until next time,

Fab 4