Captain Thomas Vermaelen has been speaking to the press today while on international duty with Belgium, and he was full of praise for his Arsenal teammates, and two in particular.

Jack's back (and he's been busy)

Speaking to Arsenal.com, Vermaelen had a lot to say about returning midfielder Jack Wilshere:

“When I was out with injury, I was in the gym a lot, Jack was in the gym even longer working hard on his weaknesses."

“You can see that now in his body on the pitch. For me he looks much stronger and that’s good. Sometimes you have to take the positives when you’re out for more than a year and I think he’s done that.”

“You know what he did in his first full season for Arsenal – he was amazing. For me, he can be one of the best midfielders in the world. He has the potential for that.

“I’m really happy he’s coming back now. He’s working on his match fitness and that’s the most important thing. I think in the future [he] will lift the team.”

While I doubt Jack will be competing with Yaya Toure any time soon, being a bit stronger will be a great help in his line of work. Not only will he be able to withstand challenges and avoid injury, his lung-bursting runs will have a bit more purpose and he'll have less chance of being outmuscled (not that that happened too often in the past).

And the rest of what Vermaelen has to say is obvious: of course Jack will be the best midfielder in the world! I may be slightly biased.

President Per is in office

Vermaelen also had a lot to say about his centre-back partner Per Mertesacker, who's emerged as Arsenal's leading centre back this season:

“In the first season players need time to adapt and with him he had a big injury at the end which meant a few months off so that wasn’t good."

"But now you can see he’s adjusted really well to the Premier League. Because he’s so clever on the pitch it makes it easier for him."

“The first couple of months he’s been really amazing I think. He’s a really experienced player, he reads the game really well and for us he’s an important player.”

I think it's no coincidence that Arsenal's defending has improved since the BFG entered the starting XI on a regular basis, and it's good to see him getting the recognition he deserves from his teammates, especially the captain.

Now Vermaelen's finished waxing lyrical about our players, maybe he could pick up an extremely minor knock so he avoids this national team nonsense, eh?

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