After the debacle of the non-signing of Radamel Falcao to Arsenal, it seems certain that we will start the new season without a top class striker in our squad.

Arsenal fans were excited about the new era, with Mesut Özil and Alexis Sanchez as our big money signings over the last 12 months, but with Olivier Giroud out until at least the New Year, things look pretty bleak.

Before Özil arrived last summer, every Arsenal fan was begging for a top striker to arrive at The Emirates. We were linked with Gonzalo Higuain, Luis Suarez, Stevan Jovetic, Loic Remy and a load of other strikers, as the media believed that was what Arsenal needed to add to their squad. The Arsenal manager of course, had other ideas and signed an attacking midfielder instead – typical Arsene.

We signed Alexis Sanchez this summer and while he is usually a wide attacker, like Thierry Henry, he wants to see the Chilean as a central striker. With Olivier Giroud in the side, Arsene’s initial plan was to ease Sanchez into the central role but now the target man is out injured, he is going to have to rush his development in that position.

That’s a lot to ask and we are going to struggle with that. Against Manchester City and Besiktas in the first leg, when Sanchez played wide on the right, he put in excellent performances. But in recent games, against Everton and Besiktas when he played centrally, he struggled. He scored a massive goal against Besiktas putting us through to the Champions League proper, but couldn’t impose himself on the game.

So that’s where we are. Despite Arsene claiming that Yaya Sanogo, Lukas Podolski, Joel Campbell, Theo Walcott (when he returns) and Alexis Sanchez can file the central role, every Arsenal fan knows he’s clutching at straws. Yaya Sanogo is the only player after Giroud who can play the main striker role, but he’s raw and yet to score a goal for Arsenal in a competitive game. Podolski, Theo, Campbell and Sanchez are all wide players with pace and not really suited to holding the ball up and bringing others into play.

Giroud was excellent at bringing players into the game, such as Ramsey, Özil, Cazorla, Wilshere and Rosicky (remember some of the amazing team goals we scored last season? Giroud was heavily involved in most of them) and make no mistake, his absence will be greatly missed – even more so if we don’t bring in a decent replacement, which looks less and less likely as time ticks on.

As Arsenal fans were excited about the possibility of Radamel Falcao coming to Arsenal, it turns out it’s all a piss take which the BBC fell for.

On the official BBC Football website, it reports that Arsenal are in talks with Falcao for a years loan move but it turns out that the “source” David Ornstein, who is a respected BBC Sport reporter wasn’t from his official Twitter account, but from a fake David Ornstein account

As of right now, the official BBC Football website still has the “Falcao to Arsenal” transfer news, but I’m sure that will be removed once they realise their massive mistake.

With the thousands of ITK Twitter accounts, and people making fake accounts to spread even more shite, you just wonder if anything will be done by Twitter and the crap that’s being spouted to a large audience.

The transfer rumour mill is in overdrive and the biggest name is being linked to Arsenal, Real Madrid and Manchester City.

Radamel Falcao, one of the most courted strikers in world football looks certain to move from AS Monaco, and the big question is where to?

Real Madrid has clearly been Falcao’s preferred destination and after banking £59.7 million for Angel Di Maria, the smart money would be on him joining Gareth Bale, Cristian Ronaldo and James Rodriguez at the Santiago Bernabeu. But do they still need to offload Karim Benzema first?

Manchester City are apparently sniffing around too, with Manchester City holding talks with Falcao’s representatives according to his agent.

And then we come to Arsenal.

We’ve been linked to Falcao for a few weeks now and the thinking is, that we’d sign him on a years loan for £20 million. This would allow Arsenal to have a top calibre striker at the club while Olivier Giroud recovers from a broken bone in his ankle, and the Columbian striker would still be free to join Real Madrid next summer.

The thinking is that Falcao only coming for a year wouldn’t “kill” the other players at Arsenal, as Arsene puts it, and Falcao would still have the move he’s always dreamed of.

And apparently, we’ve given up on our £50 million pursuit of Edinson Cavani, as we’ve left negotiations too late in the day for anything to happen.

So what do you think? Are Arsenal going to sign one of the best players in the world and have a world class striker at the club?

Or are we promoting within, using Yaya Sanogo as our main striker?

Leave your comments in the section below, and don’t forget to follow us on Twitter!

More than any other club, it seems that Arsenal suffer the most with the calibre of their squad members. We had a ridiculous number of players at this summers World Cup, meaning that in terms of starting the season, we’ve been at a big disadvantage.

The new season is only 12 days old but we’ve already played Manchester City, Crystal Palace, Besiktas twice and Everton, and despite the obvious physical limitations as well as the quality of our opponents, we haven’t lost a single game yet.

We’ve failed to get out of first gear and our performances are nowhere near the standard we can achieve. When we’re in full flow, our football is outstanding but at the moment, we’re relying on sheer grit and determination to get us through.

Fitness, sharpness and the performances will come as the season progresses, but the fact we’ve managed to be where we are now is testament to Arsene Wenger and the players.

Arsene has had to manage players coming back at different times over the summer, organise new signings and rotate the squad more than he would like at this stage – and we’ve had big players missing due to injuries and suspensions, such as Mikel Arteta, Aaron Ramsey, Olivier Giroud and Kieran Gibbs.

At Crystal Palace, we struggled but the desire got us a narrow 2-1 victory. At Besiktas, we fought well to get an away draw and at Everton, when we were 2-0 down no-one gave us a chance. But sheer will and determination secured a dramatic 2-2 draw.

And to last night.

With a team obviously lacking in match sharpness, Arsene Wenger must have been extremely proud of what he saw. To a man, every single player gave 110% effort. Whereas at Everton you could accuse a couple of players of strolling through the game, every player on the pitch against Besiktas was unbelievable. The performance might not have been as slick as it can be (that will come with time) but the fight, desire and determination shown at The Emirates was phenomenal. Players such as Alexis Sanchez, Santi Cazorla and Jack Wilshere ran and ran and ran, showing how much playing for Arsenal means. We might have rode our luck with a couple of decisions, but there’s no doubt that these players play for Arsene Wenger.

And if you look around the Premier League table, how many managers can say the same?

The effort and fight shown by the players so far this season shows the belief that something special can be achieved this season.

And when we do click into gear once everyone is fully fit, then we will be right up there competing at the very top.