In a move which was never really a secret, Lukas Podolski has travelled to Milan to finalise a loan move to Inter, after Arsenal reportedly accepted an improved offer from the Italian giants.

But the question is should Arsenal have let him go? And why have we let him go?

The Lukas Podolski situation has always been a strange one for me. He is clearly a talented player, and allegedly Steve Bould came out and said that Podolski was the best finisher he has ever seen at the club – high praise considering Steve Bould was around when players like Alan Smith, Ian Wright, Nicolas Anelka and Dennis Bergkamp were at the club.

Podolski joined Arsenal from FC Koln in the summer of 2012 and was immediately thrust into the first team alongside new signings Olivier Giroud and Santi Cazorla – and made 33 appearances in the league alone. The season after he only played 20 Premier League games, and this season he only featured in 6. So clearly, there is an issue with him at Arsenal.

But what was it? He’s had limited playing time this season but did score a vital winner against Anderlecht in the Champions League and then scored a brace against Galatasaray in the same competition – and all the goals were clinical finishes. And for me, he is a player whose finishing is right up there with the very best – surely there’s a place for a player like him who can score when given the right service?

I’m sure most Arsenal fans are wondering if it was Arsene Wenger who had a problem with him or whether the system we used was just not suited to Podolski’s game. Olivier Giroud is obviously the preferred striker and with Alexis Sanchez in sensational form and Danny Welbeck willing to run for the team, I suppose Podolski was always going to be left on the sidelines. What is strange to me however is that during Giroud’s injury spell, Podolski had something to offer. Podolski has a hammer shot but when played wide on the left his delivery is excellent – the assists he has provided over the last couple of seasons for Giroud alone were top drawer.

Also, there are times when Arsenal lack a Plan B or just need to mix things up a little. Podolski (if used right) would be perfect for that but was never used. For a player of his ability, I find it strange that he hasn’t featured more this season. You don’t just turn into a poor player overnight and when you have seen Podolski play, he’s scored goals.

There’s no doubt that Lukas will be happier at Inter Milan where I am sure he will get much more playing time, but my regret is that we didn’t use him to his full potential – and for me he is someone that could definitely help the current Arsenal team.

But what do you think? Should Arsenal have kept Lukas Podolski at the club? Cast your vote below and leave your thoughts in the comments section!

We enter a brand new year full of optimism a hope, but that was dashed pretty quickly against Southampton this afternoon.

Two mistakes by Szczesny meant that we lost against a Southampton side who weren’t at their best today. Southampton were without their best player Morgan Schneiderlin, but still managed to outfox Arsenal and create plenty of chances – Southampton striker Graziano Pelle had five shots on goal today including two attempts hitting the post and one was cleared off the line.

For Southamptons opener, Szczesny came flying off his line giving Sadio Mane a relatively simple opportunity to place his shot into an empty net. And for their second, the Pole kicked the ball to Tadic who accepted the gift and slotted in from close range.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, Szczesny is always prone to making big mistakes and he’s done it again today. If you take away the mistakes the game was pretty even and both sides fashioned chances – so without the mistakes Arsenal might have got at least a point.

Arsene Wenger needs to man up and drop him for 5 or 6 games. Bring in Martinez or Ospina and give them a run in the team. Otherwise what’s the point of having backup goalkeepers?

But it’s the same old story with Arsenal isn’t it? Arsene Wenger is a fantastic manager who has done wonders for the club but we’re stuck in that awkward situation where no-one at the club knows what to do – Arsene Wenger is a manager who is clearly incapable of creating and nurturing a side good enough to win the Premier League, but at the same time he knows how to get Arsenal into the Top Four every single season.

And that’s the bottom line. Champions League football is the minimum a side like Arsenal should be achieving and Arsene Wenger is the man who can guarantee it every year. And at the end of the day, risking that to see if we can find a manager who can take us to the next level is too much of a risk to take for the Arsenal board.

Well I didn’t expect that.

With teams like Barcelona, Bayern Munich, Real Madrid and Athletico Madrid all possibilities, I thought we were nailed on for getting one of the big boys (or should that be “massive” boys?).

The two other teams which weren’t superpowers were Monaco and FC Porto. Don’t get me wrong, they are still excellent sides who are very dangerous (you wouldn’t have made it out of the group if you weren’t) but they aren’t as daunting as playing a side such as Real Madrid or Bayern Munich.

And to make matters even more awesome Chelsea, a side notorious for getting easy draws in the Champions League (an honour they share with Manchester United) drew Paris St-Germain. Of the second placed teams they could have been put up against, they were probably the most difficult side to face. Manchester City drew Barcelona, which will be a massive test as they face Luis Suarez, Neymar Jr and Lionel Messi over two legs.

But back to Arsenal, and every Arsenal fan has to be pleased with that draw. When it comes to the Champions League, I’ve always said it doesn’t matter who you face in the knockout stages because if you want to win it then you’re going to have to play the best teams anyway. But since we’ve been knocked out of the last 16 for the last few seasons, it would be nice to have a first round knockout game where we didn’t think we could progress – with Monaco, we have a real chance of getting into the last 8 if we play at our maximum performance levels.

I always believe that if we play our best football we are a real threat to any side in European football.

So there we are. Do you think it was a good draw for Arsenal?

Do you think we can reach the last 8? Or will Monaco prove more difficult that we think and knock us out?

Leave your thoughts in the comments section below!

Arsenal fans have suffered a lot over the last 9 seasons with the highest ticket prices in the country, and the lack of trophies arriving at The Emirates. At the end of last season, it seemed as if we had turned the corner somewhat, with the FA Cup win in May. Since then however, any credit Arsene Wenger thought he had has quickly run out.

The summer was one of optimism for Arsenal fans, with the arrival of Alexis Sanchez who has hit the ground running and has quickly become our best player by a country mile. Despite playing in the World Cup he seems still seems to have the best work rate and his effort and desire are off the charts. His Arsenal teammates would do well to learn from his example, and players such as Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain are.

In early December things looked bleak – we were 6th place in the Premier League, 13 points off Chelsea who have pretty much got the title sewn up with 6 months of the season remaining. On the flip side however, we were only 2 points off a Top Four position.

But herein lies the problem – teams like Manchester United, Liverpool, Tottenham Hotspur and Everton – teams who you would expect to be fighting for a Top Four place – are all under performing, some in spectacular fashion. Yet we haven’t taken advantage of this and have been struggling badly ourselves.

Just like in previous seasons where teams around us have played poorly, we’ve not managed to get any real consistency and put in a real challenge for the title.

But in a strange way, that’s probably the reason why Arsene Wenger is the right man for Arsenal.

It’s a fact which is rehashed time and time again but it is true – Arsenal have been in the Top Four and been in the Champions League for the last 17 seasons. The likelihood is that we will be in the Top Four again this season while teams like Liverpool and Manchester United may not be. To achieve that level of consistency (even though it’s not the kind we would like) is still a massively impressive achievement.

How many times have we seen it before? Liverpool almost won the Premier League last season and where are they now? Manchester United won the league and then brought in a new manager and it all fell apart. Would you really like to get rid of Wenger, do well one season and then fade into the abyss the season after?

Look at the man who has been touted as Arsene’s replacement Jurgen Klopp. Borussia Dortmund now sit at the bottom of the Bundesliga. Now you will point to the fact that he has lost his best players in Mario Gotze and Robert Lewandowski in the last few summers but does that not sound familiar? Arsene Wenger has lost Robin van Persie, Samir Nasri, Cesc Fabregas, Emmanuel Adebayor, Kolo Toure, Thomas Vermaelen, Gael Clichy, Bacary Sagna and a host of other players yet managed to keep us in the Top Four – and added an FA Cup triumph last season.

Jurgen Klopp is one of the best managers in world football and look how he is struggling. Arsene Wenger has lost arguably more players yet still maintained that level of consistency.

While I would be the first to admit that Arsene Wenger has his failings, which manager doesn’t? No manager is perfect and while it is perfectly understandable that you want more (I am the same) and want more trophies, sometimes circumstances conspire against you. Sure, the Top Four might not be what Arsenal fans want but considering everything Arsene Wenger has had to endure over the last 10 seasons, you cannot deny that any other manager in world football probably wold have fallen short of consistent Top Four finishes.

In a way, Arsene Wenger has been consistently over-achieving and has made a rod for his own back.

Arsenal are now looking more financially stable and over the next few seasons, I have no doubt that Arsene Wenger will assemble a real team capable of mounting a real challenge for the Premier League title.

He has managed to get Arsenal to this position, so he deserves the chance (within his current contract) to prove that the decisions he has made were right and given the opportunity to build a squad that he thinks can win the Premier League.

Since the disappointing defeat to Stoke City away (which I maintain Arsene could not be acceptable for – Mertesacker and Chambers were to blame there) we’ve won in style against Galatasaray and Newcastle United. And before that we beat Southampton, Borussia Dortmund and West Bromwich Albion.

That’s 5 wins in our last 6 games, and if Chambers didn’t get sent off I highly doubt we would have lost against Stoke City.

They say the grass is greener on the other side, but in this case the other side is a garden full of rhizomorphs. Basically not good.

Arsene Wenger is a manager who should be revered and appreciated. He has done magical things for this football club.

After a 3 game winning streak against Borussia Dortmund, West Brom and Southampton, it seemed that Arsenal had finally turned the corner. The defensive lapses and naivety had seemingly gone and there was a new found confidence in the squad. Arsenal also had Olivier Giroud back from injury, and he could help Danny Welbeck and Alexis Sanchez at the attacking end of the pitch. Mathieu Flamini has slowly improved his defensive game, playing a more mature role and Santi Cazorla, Aaron Ramsey and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain were all finding form at last.

But poor performances from Per Mertesacker and Calum Chambers yesterday threw away all our good work over the last couple of weeks.

You know what you’re going to get when you visit Stoke City. The sad thing was they don’t play long balls as much as they used to under Tony Pulis and under Mark Hughes they play more on the ground. They will still use their height advantage at times but it wasn’t as intense as it was in the good old days. Yet we still gifted them a ridiculous 3 goal lead which was hugely preventable.

For the first goal, it wasn’t even a long, looping ball which usually causes us problems, it was a simple cross from the right hand side which Calum Chambers horribly misjudged and this causes chaos in the box. The ball bounced into the path Peter Crouch who had a simply tap in from 4 yards. It was noticeable that on the initial cross there was no leader ship from Mertesacker, and he was nowhere near the danger or ball. Where the hell was he?

For the second goal, Per Mertesacker who was our captain was once again nowhere to be seen. Another cross found Bojan who slotted in from 7 yards and had no Arsenal player within 5 yards of him. A simple goal which only Arsenal could concede. How one of Stoke’s main strikers wasn’t picked up so far into the penalty area is beyond ridiculous. While in past games you could blame the team or even the manager for our defeats, the defensive lapses from Chambers and Mertesacker cost us dearly here.

We went 3-0 down after Walters rifled in from 2 yards out after Arsenal failed to deal with a  Stoke corner. Per Mertesacker opted to inexplicably leave the ball he could have won while Calum Chambers was nowhere.

So we went into the half time break 3-0 down, conceding some of the most ridiculous goals you’ll ever want to see. Mertesacker and Chambers were being given the run around by someone who is more suited to Basketball and a Barcelona reject.

Whatever Arsene Wenger said at half time seemed to work as Arsenal amazingly found themselves only 3-2 down with a good 25 minutes remaining after Santi Cazorla converted a penalty won by Mathieu Flamini and after Aaron Ramsey scored a rasping volley from a corner.

But then Calum Chambers once again hit the self-destruct button. Arsenal are threadbare at the back after injuries to Mathieu Debuchy, Nacho Monreal and Laurent Koscielny, so getting sent off is idiotic. Added to that, we were well in the game and looked like getting at least a draw but once Chambers got stupidly sent off any chance of a comeback was well and truly over.

A valiant effort by Arsenal which was thrown away by extremely poor performances by two Arsenal players. This is an Arsenal defeat you cannot pin on Arsene Wenger.