Andre Santos’ defensive abilities have been defended (excuse the pun) by Arsene Wenger.
Santos has earned mixed reviews from the Arsenal fans and media since his £6 million summer move from Fenerbahce.
Santos, who appeared regularly on the score sheet for the Turkish side, scored his first Premier League goal for Arsenal in their 5-3 victory over Chelsea at Stamford Bridge last Saturday, which helped win some supporters over, though a handful of them are still concerned with his defensive displays that he’s shown this season.
However, Wenger has reassured fans that the attacking full-back can defend, insisting the 28-year-old is still adapting to life in England. In addition, Wenger feels the attacking facet of the Brazilian can be a bonus for Arsenal.
Wenger said:
‘I’m happy when he has the ball and I feel that personally he is much better defensively than many people think.’
‘He’s getting stronger with every game, he’s a very intelligent boy who learns very quickly and of course he has to adapt to the pace of the English game, it’s not easy to play game after game.’
In my opinion Santos is better off playing as a left winger. His attacking abilities really help Arsenal push forward, and with Vermaelen now back in the squad, the Belgian could play as a makeshift left-back as he used to fill in that slot on occasions during his time at Ajax. This could then see Per and Koscielny take up the centre-back roles.
We know Andre is still settling in to the side, let’s just hope either his defending improves or he becomes a left winger as time rolls on.
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He reminds me of sylvinho”s strike against chelsea, he has been better than clichy and gibbs defensively and offensively for just the few games he played for arsenal and i hear people saying he’s bad defensively, so i ask who has been better? clichy, gibbs?