Arsenal: Lacking the bite away?

Just as Arsenal fans finished having a good laugh at the Spurs, laughter turned to disbelief as Arsenal went crashing down 1-0 to Fulham at Craven Cottage.

Under a new and experienced manager in Roy Hogdson, Fulham looked much better and more organized than the side that barely survived relegation last season.

With 10.5 million pounds signing Andrew Johnson looking on from the stands, Fulham still possessed the necessary firepower to beat Arsenal.

Arsenal were simply awful. After struggling to beat W.B.A at home, Arsenal's fallacies were all exposed in this away game.

Somehow, Samir Nasri failed to impose the similar style of dominance against Fulham. For large parts of this match, he was invisible as Arsenal move forward in attack.

With the commentator mentioning that Arsenal were not going through Walcott in their attacks, it signified the poor game that Walcott had again on Arsenal's right wing.

Perhaps the biggest culprit of the night was Robin Van Persie. He was lacklustre in all departments of his game. After being left out of the starting line up last week against W.B.A, Van Persie showed exactly why he deserved a spot on the bench with a woeful display against Fulham.

Van Persie looked like a shadow of his former self last night. His once potent freekicks were now reduced to harmless rugby conversions that will have a higher chance of injuring a Fulham fan than finding the back of the net.

If he didn't score a conversion, he was hitting the backside of Fulham players with his freekicks.

After dropping behind to fit a Bendtner and Adebayor strike partnership, his performance still did not improve.

Van Persie is either rusty or just having a really bad day in office.

More importantly, Arsenal's display against Fulham today exposed the lack of experience players in the Arsenal line up. With no such player to summon from the bench, Wenger resorted to bringing in Alexandre Song and Nicklaus Bendtner to rescue the game. It was evident that these two were not going to be effective in doing so.

I remembered writing that Arsenal needs one more quality midfielder to complete the team this season. And after last night's performance, my view is increasingly reinforced. Arsenal simply doesn't have a player that can control the midfield.

With Cesc Fabregas out, Arsenal really looked short of ideas. As an Arsenal fan, I really hope that his return will spell positive things.

If not, Wenger has to sign another midfielder.

With last night's defeat, he has to do so in a hurry.