Ian Wright believes that Arsene Wenger’s decision to play Theo Walcott as a striker has come five years too late and that they are trying to sign Karim Benzema because of Olivier Giroud’s poor form.

Theo struggled against Newcastle when he was played up front in place of Giroud but to be fair to him, his cause was not helped by Newcastle being reduced to ten men which saw the Magpies drop deeper. This left no space in behind for him to run into but, even then, it is hard to see him as the answer to this supposed striker problem at the club.

Missing two good chances, once of which he should have scored as he followed in a rebound and was presented with an open net, he was taken off in the second half and replaced by Giroud who, let’s face it, didn’t do much better.

Speaking as a pundit on BT Sport after the game, legend Ian Wright, who knows a thing or two about being an effective forward, said “They needed to do this five years ago if they were going to take him out of the right-hand side and into the centre and try to teach him how to make those runs.

“Now all of a sudden that Giroud isn’t playing well, they’re trying to get Benzema.

“He scored a hat-trick against let’s face it West Brom at the end of last season and a very poor Aston Villa side in the FA Cup final and now they’re putting him up front and basically telling him to get on with it.

“He needed to be in this position four or five years ago learning because he’s not a bad finisher.”

As for Benzema, the striker has made it very clear that he has no intention of leaving Real Madrid so I wish people would just leave it alone now, it’s starting to come across as a little bit desperate.