What Nicklas Bendtner Brings To Arsenal

What can you say about Nicklas Bendtner?

He contrives to miss a hat-trick of chances, and the next game he pops up with a hat-trick in a critical Champions' League game.

There is a large amount of hoopla in the British media about Bendtner, about how great or how useless he truly is.

But the fact remains that he is a crucial and a critical element in Arsenal's title and CL ambitions.

Here is why.

What Bendtner is—He brings balance to the team. He is a strong classical center forward. He can hold up the ball, he poses an aerial challenge for defenders, and he can win long balls from the goalkeeper.

He moves into the right striking positions .

He seems to always be there for crosses and through passes from our heavily talented midfield. He is a great target-man for Fabregas, Arshavin, Nasri, Walcott and Rosicky.

He ghosts into the box instinctively, putting defenders on their back feet and opens up the space for our attackers. He is the second dimension in a one dimensional Arsenal team.

He has attitude.

He does not get bogged down by the glaring and sometimes astounding misses that we witnessed against Burnley. He shrugged that one off as if it was a mere aberration, smiling as he was substituted. His body language against Porto was fantastic, with no signs of baggage from Burnley.

He has bags of confidence.

Some may call this cockiness, but for the current Arsenal team, overloaded with inexperienced youngsters, confidence and a dash of cockiness can only be a good thing.

He is only 22 years old.

Bendtner has come a long way, and has a long way to go.

What Bendtner is not —He is not Thierry Henry, or Ruud van Nistelrooy. Bendtner is not the best player on the planet. He cannot produce a goal like Nasri's, and he doesn't even have a decent first touch.

Presently, he is at best an above average striker. But from an Arsenal point of view, it's better to have an above average striker than no striker. His replacement would be Eduardo, who is going through a bad patch of form at the moment.

Bendtner will be critical in the run in, starting from Saturday, from Hull to....Madrid?

We shall wait and see.

What do you guys think?