2. The Battle Of The Strikers
Despite all the negativity surrounding Arsenal over the last few weeks the recent emergence of Olivier Giroud as a Premiership quality front man has been one of the more positive things for Arsenal fans. After a fairly quiet early few months in red & white following his move last summer from Montpelier, Giroud now has 14 first team goals this season which added to the 18 scored by Theo Walcott is certainly not a bad return on investment and signifies a strike force to reckon with for the shaky Villa defence. The same positivity regarding goal scoring could also be levelled at Aston Villa with Christian Benteke being arguably one of the finds of this season. The only question that remains over the Villa strike force is the on-going in/out relationship Paul Lambert appears to have with Darren Bent. There has obviously been some form of falling out between the two men and Lamberts continual use of Bent as no more than a substitute is clearly not helping the Villa cause. Proven successful strikers in the Premiership are few and far between and regardless of their personal relationship a Villa team without Bent in the starting line-up is far less likely to be a threat to the Arsenal defence than it could be.