Sometimes it can feel like it takes something really special for Arsene Wenger to give up on a young player, but there was a certain inevitability about Nicklas Bendtner reaching the end of the Gillespie Road this summer. If any player represented Arsenal’s difficulty in bringing promise to suitable fruition it was the 23-year-old Dane, a monument of undimmed confidence in his own sea of diminishing returns.

The world is full of footballers without a realistic grasp of their own limitations. Rarely a season opening goes by, for example, without Shola Ameobi stating his England ambitions. Who can blame them? In such a cut-throat field, a player is likely to run aground quickly without self-belief. Bendtner, however, is on a different level.

In February, sports psychologist Jacques Crevoisier spoke to Swedish magazine Offside about a series of tests he helped to carry out on the Arsenal squad. “One of the categories is called ‘self perceived competence,’ i.e. how good the player himself thinks he is,’’ he said. ‘‘On a scale up to 9, Bendtner got 10! We have never seen that before. Pat Rice was sitting next to me and couldn’t stop laughing.”

One presumes that the incorrigibility of Bendtner’s trademark character was what tickled the Arsenal assistant manager’s funnybone, rather than what many believe is the absurd notion of the striker being anywhere near as good as he thinks he is. Even his sizeable self-regard has not helped, it is Bendtner’s failure to make good on the considerable fanfare that accompanied his arrival in north London as a 16-year-old (in 2004) that has cost him.

With his status as an epitome of the general failure of Arsenal’s fine young talent to grow up quickly enough (or, in some cases, at all), it is easy to forget how much of a prospect the striker was considered back then. Having shone for the Denmark under-16 side, he arrived in London N5 with a reputation as a genuine wunderkind. A season on loan at Birmingham City in 2006/07 under Steve Bruce, the manager charged with refocusing his club career now at Sunderland, seemed to confirm the ability of Bendtner to translate his gifts into substance against an unforgiving backdrop. 

It’s not as if his Emirates career has been without highlight, but the fact remains that his breakthrough season of 2008/09 still represents his best goal haul (nine in the league, 15 in all competitions). As always, the statistics don’t tell the full story. Bendtner is one of those players that English football finds very difficult to categorise, and therefore hard to use effectively. Just as the rangy Edin Dzeko is consistently referred to (incorrectly) as a ‘target man’, the 6’5 Bendtner has so many more strings to his bow than just being a significant aerial threat.

To fully appreciate his talents and his continuing potential, it’s worth looking at him in an environment where he does consistently thrive – the international arena. Since making his Denmark debut in 2006, he has tended to be as reliable as he has been flaky at club level. After his double strike on Tuesday saw the Danes overcome neighbours Norway 2-0 at Copenhagen’s Parken Stadium, Bendtner has a very respectable 16 goals in 41 appearances for his country.

Again, his displays for Denmark are about so much more than the raw numbers. Bendtner was superb against Norway, providing not just strength but the technical guile required to break down a Norway side that had conceded just four times in six Euro 2012 qualifiers before the game, and has a good chance of qualifying for its first major tournament since the 2000 European Championships. He was at the genesis of the move which led to the first goal, picking up the ball in midfield before continuing his run into the box and smashing in Dennis Rommedahl’s cross at the near post. For the second, he played a neat one-two with Christian Eriksen before guiding a superb finish into the corner from outside the area, albeit with a touch of help from goalkeeper Rune Jarstein’s ponderous late dive.

Bendtner almost helped to top off the win in the second half, again dropping deep and threading through a superb pass to Eriksen, whose shot was this time well tipped over by Jarstein. His all-round game, which stretches beyond the usual remit of a centre-forward, could be argued to be at the root of his relative failure at Arsenal. Wenger’s acknowledgement of Bendtner’s versatility led him to play the Dane on the right wing on occasion, a factor that – as pointed out by Eurosport’s Tom Adams - partly explains his difficulties in making the most of first-team opportunities.

This season, Bendtner should have an extended go in his preferred central role at Sunderland, and there is little reason to assume he won’t flourish. “When Bendtner misses a chance,” continued Crevoisier in February, “he is always genuinely convinced that it wasn’t his fault. You might say that’s a problem, and to a certain degree it can be. But you can also view it as this guy has a remarkable ability to come back after set-backs.” Thinking back to Bendtner’s most significant contributions for Arsenal, they were often last-gasp winners – the goals against Hull and Wolves in spring 2010 that maintained the Gunners’ title challenge, for example. Clearly, he never stops believing. If harnessed correctly, what many assume to be Bendtner’s biggest flaw could prove to be his greatest strength.