Cowabunga!

We're asking which turtle the 'The Ox' would be because he reckons he bears an uncanny resemblance to one of them -something he poked fun at in a video for Stonewall's Rainbow Laces campaign last year, From heroes in a half-shell to real-life role models: we're talking to Oxlade-Chamberlain at Arsenal's London Colney training base, the day after the official retirement of Thierry Henry. Does he have a favourite Henry moment?

"I can give you a few," says the 21-year-old. "The goal he scored in the [north London] derby when he ran the whole pitch, the one against Man U where he's flicked it up and volleyed it. The one he scored when he came back against Leeds is probably the one that's got the biggest reaction from me in terms of how I felt in that moment, When he scored that one, I was just sat there with goosehumps. It was a surreal feeling."

He glances up at the wall, where a giant image of the Frenchman stares down from a photographic mural of the Invincibles squad. "He's looking at me as I'm saying all this - he's just up there, smiling!"

Oxlade-Chamberlain might have chosen Michelangelo, the 'party dude', as his turtle alter ego, but he is a mature and eloquent figure. In November, he passed the 100-game mark for Arsenal

To read the full article, download issue 389 of sport today...