Philippe Senderos

Philippe Senderos profile

• Name

  Philippe Senderos

• Born

  February 14, 1985

• Geneva, Switzerland

• Position

  Defender

• Squad Number

  6

• Previous Club(s)

  Servette

• Joined Arsenal

  June 01, 2003

• Arsenal Debut

  Manchester City (a)

• Carling Cup

• October 27, 2004

• Won 2-1

• First Arsenal Goal

  W.B.A. (a)

• Premier League

• October 15, 2005

• Lost 2-1

It's hard to recall a better centre-half performance from last season than Philippe's display against Milan in the Champions League.

The Swiss defender tends to be judged on his rare mistakes but he was outstanding after replacing the injured Kolo Toure after seven minutes of the first leg against the reigning European champions. Philippe snuffed out the threat of Kaka, Alexandre Pato and company before repeating the trick in the San Siro 13 days later. Ironically, he has now joined those players after agreeing a season-long loan with Milan.

Philippe's tenacity, aerial power and will to win are valuable assets. Also he tends to thrive when he gets a run in the side. That was certainly the case at the start of last season when William Gallas was unavailable and Philippe contributed to six clean sheets in his first eight games. He made 31 appearances in total during the 2007/08 campaign and popped up with a couple of goals too.

It's easy to forget that Philippe is still a young player because he seems to have been around for a while, not just at Arsenal but at international level too. He was part of the Swiss defence which did not concede a goal at the 2006 World Cup and played every minute of his country's campaign at Euro 2008.