After another tragically dull international break, all those silly World Cup qualifiers are finished and Arsenal get their players back in preparation for Saturday's game at Norwich.

Disappointment for Deutschland's Gunners

Per Mertesacker played the full 90 in a remarkable game for Germany, in which they squandered a 4-0 lead to draw 4-4 with Sweden. Arsenal style! It's worth pointing out that Per wasn't really to blame for Germany's capitulation, his defence partner Badstuber giving an awful performance.

Lukas Podolski came on as an 87th minute substitute and should be as fresh as a daisy. Hopefully.

French Fancies

After Laurent Koscielny's injury scare he recovered to play all of France's games, a 1-0 defeat to Japan and a 1-1 draw with World/European/Universal champions Spain. Despite giving away a penalty against Spain he played well, by all accounts. Cesc missed the penalty by the way. Hee hee.

The plaudits will go to Olivier Giroud, however. The striker came on late against Spain and scored the equaliser with practically the last kick of the game. Well, head to be precise. That won't hurt his confidence.

Mixed fortunes for the Three (Two) Lions

Theo Walcott lasted all of 3 minutes before receiving a bruised lung against San Marino and has been ruled out for two weeks.

On the other hand, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain played 90 minutes against San Marino, notching his first international goal, and then gave a decent 15 minute cameo in England's 1-1 draw with Poland.

Carl Jenkinson also trained with England and should be called up for the next set of international games in November.

The others

Santi Cazorla played most of the game against Giroud and Koscielny's France, while Johan Djourou helped Switzerland to a 2-0 win over Iceland in Reyjavik. Skipper Thomas Vermaelen was also involved in a 2-0 win, in this case with Belgium against Scotland. Gervinho played in the Ivory Coast's controversial and unfinished game with Senegal and was unhurt by the crowd trouble.

Finally, Aaron Ramsey was suspended for Wales as they went down 2-0 in Croatia.

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