1. Lukas Podolski is definitely out of favour
As if we didn’t know there was something wrong to begin with, yesterday’s match against West Ham United all but confirmed it. Lukas Podolski started and finished on the bench despite Olivier Giroud being sidelined for his red card against QPR. I should probably rephrase that last sentence: Poldoski never left the bench. This season Poldi has played a total of 106 minutes over seven games in the Premier League, yet in five games played in the Champions League he’s scored three goals. Danny Welbeck and Alexis Sánchez have also scored three goals each in the Champions League but Podolski played for a total of 139 minutes – that’s an average of 1.94 goals scored per 90 minutes. So why won’t Wenger give Poldi a chance playing for Arsenal in the Premier League? Wenger has been quoted “In every big club you have some players who don’t play and they are not happy. He will play” as well as “Lukas Podolski is not a player I’m willing to sell”. Yesterday was a prime opportunity for Wenger to put his money where his mouth is. Podolski says he wants to “sit down with Arsene Wenger in the New Year” and “I’ll talk to Arsenal. I need to know their intentions. Wenger is not blind, he sees what I can give”. However, rumours are currently rife it would seem that a loan deal with Inter Milan is all “but done”. Apparently Wenger was not happy that Inter Milan spoke to Podolski before they approached Arsenal. Could this be even more reason that Podolski is out of favour at the moment?