Arsenal certainly have a hell of a lot of midfielders at the moment, although Tomas Rosicky, Jack Wilshere and Emmanuel Frimpong won’t be available for another couple of months at least, so you would think that Wenger would have an array of different choices of who to play down the middle now that Alex Song has moved to Barcelona.
But it seems that the young Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain is very keen on taking Song’s mantle in the middle of the park, and he is practically begging Wenger to let him move inside from his usual wing position. ‘They are big shoes to fill but you’ve got that anywhere at Arsenal,’ the Ox said.
‘In any position you’ve got a big role to play and big shoes to fill. You only have to look back at the “Invincibles” and the team that won the league — they are massive shoes to fill for us.
‘Whenever you’re playing on the pitch you have to step up to the plate and perform.
‘Alex Song was a great player for us and he was a big player for us — but we’ve got a strong enough squad. I’m definitely confident of that and I’m definitely confident of filling Alex’s role.’
‘I remember on the day I actually signed he asked me where I saw myself playing.
‘My dad was in the room and said ‘Centre mid, he’s a midfielder
‘The boss sort of laughed and said ‘I think he could be as well’. He said maybe to start off with I would be out wide and last season I did play the majority of my games on the wing.
‘But the boss has been pushing more this season to try my hand in a more central position.
‘If I can prove I can play in that position as well then that will help me and my career at Arsenal.’
Now that Diaby is back to fitness it seems that Wenger is keen for the Frenchman to start every game in Songs old position, while Oxlade-Chamberlain only played the last 20 minutes of yesterday’s game (out on the wing again), but surely Diaby won’t stay fit for ever and leave a gap again in the middle.
Do you think that Oxlade-Chamberlain should be given his wish to play in the centre at some point this season?
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