Arsenal forward Lukas Podolski has declared that he is excited by the prospect of touring Asia with the Gunners this summer.

Podolski missed last summer's tour of the Far East due to international commitments, but after a brief break has been included in manager Arsene Wenger's 24-man squad to visit Indonesia, Vietnam and Japan.

He told the club's official website: "I'm happy to go there because we have a lot of fans there. I see a lot of Indonesian, Japanese and Vietnamese fans on my Twitter account.

"We are there for two weeks and will visit different countries so I'm happy to be there. We have four matches so I'm looking forward to the tour. I enjoy all the things on tour, being with the team-mates at the hotel and looking around the city, I've never been there before, playing matches and spending time with fans.

"You have a lot of things to do there and after your career, when you are old, you can tell your son that you've been to Vietnam or Indonesia and it was a great tour. The people there are crazy about football. Some clubs only stay in the UK, or when you are in Germany they always stay there, so I think it's important to make a tour like this and meet the fans there."

The Gunners will be without club captain Thomas Vermaelen and Gervinho when they leave for Jakarta today through injury and illness respectively.