I am saving this post to question the ability and the desire of Mathieu Flamini to do well or improve for the sake of Arsenal. I have been watching him closely since his mistake that led to our losing goal against West Ham, and after the game against Bolton, I am convinced that he's not going to be a star for Gunners.
He doesn't have the long legs that can win tackles, not fast/aggresive enough to win 50-50 balls, and not tall enough to care and head the ball properly. All he does is pulling your shirt, using his arm to try and put you off, just nowhere near being as good as Gilberto, and forget about comparing him with Vieira.
Yes, he did score the 1st goal against Liverpool, and it was a very, very rare goal in the 1st half! (How amazing?!). But it was due to the good build-up between Hleb and Fabregas, I will curse at him if he couldn't finish that kind of chance.
Against Bolton, his performance was just as expected. He's not the reason we lost, but I still must voice up about his inabilities to complement the way we play our football. because when we have Van Persie, Rosicky, Ljungberg, Fabregas, Hleb, Eboue or even Walcott going all out attack, we need BITE in the midfield to protect our goal, and Gilberto doing the dirty job alone is not enough, for the future or in the long run.
Never mind about his good games at left back, coz he is a midfielder.