Vermaelen Admires Bendtner For His Confidence

Last Tuesday (9/3/2010) was a very pleasuring night for Arsenal as they booked their place in the Champions League Quarter-Final in a tremendous way. They were humiliating the Portuguese giant Porto by 5-0 score after previously down 2-1 on the 1st leg. The night became a greater night as Nicklas Bendtner collected his first hat-trick in a competitive football.

And The Dane is now being praised by teammate, Thomas Vermaelen.

"For us it's good that Nicklas is there, you can give the long ball and he wins headers and you can put opponents under pressure. Sometimes that is really good. It gives you more options." said the centre-back.

The Belgium international was also impressed by the confidence that Bendtner had.

"Bendtner came back brilliantly," he said. "As a striker you have to stay confident all the time because there are some games when you don't score and that was the case on Saturday."

Referred to the last Premier League game against Burnley when Bendtner missed number of chances, which seems easy to some people, in rather stupid ways. Luckily Arsenal won 3-1 with goals from Cesc Fabregas, Theo Walcott, and Andrei Arshavin.

"On Saturday he was still confident and I appreciate that because for a striker you have to be like that all the time. After Porto he was no different to how he was against Burnley, he was just happy with the three goals and how he performed.

"Against Porto he responded brilliantly. He didn't only score three goals, he won a lot of headers and that is important for the team.

"He doesn't struggle with confidence and that is a good thing for a striker. You always need a good centre-forward who scores goals for the team, he did that against Porto and I hope he will score a lot of goals in the future."

Yes, The Dane is certainly famous for his self-assurance. The most remarkable words were when he declared that he'll be a striker with a star-quality within short time. Here is what he said:

“Within five years I want to be the top scorer in the Premier League and I want to be known as a world-class striker. And it will happen. Trust me, it will happen.

“I look around at other players, I see my own ability and I can't see anything that tells me it won't happen. I'm sure people will think 'What is he talking about?' But as I have done before, and as I will do again, I will sit at the other end and laugh at those people when it is all done.”

Speaking of the quality for becoming 'world-class striker',Thomas commented:

"He is still young, he has a lot of qualities - he's here at Arsenal so that means he has a lot of qualities. I hope he will score a lot of goals in the future to help us."

Okay, let's hope so.