Walcott has shown some impressive form in recent games.
Former Arsenal defender Martin Keown has told the Daily Mail that Theo Walcott now seems the real deal with his impressive form this campaign.
Walcott has started the season in excellent form by scoring five goals in seven games in all competitions, including a brace in the Champions League win over Basel on Wednesday.
There have been some frustrations that Walcott has not ever really fulfilled his potential but his promising start to the season suggests that it could be a big year for the player.
In his Tackle Keown column for the Daily Mail, Keown said: “Theo Walcott seems the real deal now. You can see in his eyes he’s really focused.
“But it’s not like suddenly all the issues go away for him. He needs to be driven in a relentless quest to put himself up alongside the greats of the past who he rubbed shoulders with when he arrived 10 years ago.”
Whether he can keep this going for the entire season is the big question – which Keown asks of the entire Arsenal side after their recent impressive form by saying they needed to be judged after 30 games.
If he keeps a similar goalscoring record going throughout the course of the season, then it will certainly be the season when people will feel Walcott has come of age.
He signed as a teenager from Southampton back in the summer of 2006 as a player with immense potential. There have been flickers of the talent that made Arsene Wenger move for him at such a young age but there it has not been shown on a consistent basis during the course of a season.
Now he has the opportunity to answer those particular critics.
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