Bendtner May Have Scored, But His Overall Performance Left A Lot To Be Desired

Nicklas Bendtner was handed his first Arsenal start since March 2011 last night against Hull, and it caused some mixed reactions to say the least. However, thanks to a sublime Carl Jenkinson cross the Denmark international was able to nod in the opener after just two minutes of play, much to the surprise of the crowd. However, despite his goal, his overall performance left a lot to be desired, for me.

Being seated just above the goal he scored in last night, I had a good view of what he was doing.

He was understandably rusty in his movement and his off the ball runs were easily picked off by the Hull defence – something you wouldn’t have seen on Match of the Day.

He also seemed hesitant in going up for aerial duels, which is actually unlike him. His spring was missing and as a result he lost out on most of the headers he went up for.

In typical Bendtner style, everything that was floated up to him bounced away, and when the likes of Mesut Ozil, Aaron Ramsey and Tomas Rosicky were flooding forward I actually felt sorry for Bendtner as he stood by and tried not to get in the way.

He should probably have done better with a chance right on the goal-line, too, but he was unable to sort his feet out.

It may seem like that I am slating him just because of his reputation, but although I admit that he deserves credit for getting the goal, his overall performance needed a lot of work in my eyes.