Positive Signs As Arsenal Beat Brentford

Arsenal kept their winning streak going last night as they won 3-1 at home to Brentford to progress to the last 16 of the Carabao Cup. Unai Emery was able to make nine changes from the team that won 2-0 on Sunday against Everton without seeming to affect the way the team played. The only changes he didn’t make were Shkodran Mustafi and Nacho Monreal who had to play with no alternatives to them due to injuries.

Thankfully it looks like the injury situation could be sorting itself out with Sokratis Papastathopoulos available for the game against Watford on Saturday and Sead Kolasinac on the bench last night. We should see both Ainsley Maitland-Niles and Konstantinos Mavropanos back in the fold quite soon too with Laurent Koscielny hopefully following in early November. All of those players returning and the form of some of the players who are getting a game in the Europa League and Carabao Cup should give the manager a few selection headaches, but I can’t see him worrying about it too much.

On the bad news front it is being reported almost everywhere that there is no longer a contract on the table for Aaron Ramsey and he will be a free agent next summer. Hopefully the club intend to do everything they can to keep him, but they might have to consider selling him on the cheap in the January transfer window if he still won’t sign up. It won’t be easy to convince him to leave in January knowing he can go for free in the summer and command a huge signing on fee.

The manager has to decide whether he sticks with a player who looks determined to leave or he goes with those who want to play for the team. Both Alex Iwobi and Henrikh Mkhitaryan played well last night and could possibly fill the role Ramsey fills at the moment and Emile Smith-Rowe has to be a consideration for back up in that role too. Ideally I would like Ramsey to stay, but if he is determined to leave then the manager has to contemplate whether his heart is in it or not.

For a change in recent games last night we were very impressive in the first half and fell away after the break. Brentford are a good team and when they pulled a goal back they sensed nervousness in us, but they never really capitalised on it. The late introduction of Alexandre Lacazette, Lucas Torreira and Ramsey helped us to see the game out with Lacazette adding a late goal to the brace Danny Welbeck got in the first half.

We’re through to the last 16 with teams like City, Chelsea and Spurs through too and the draw takes place at the usual time of 9pm on Saturday night. I can only imagine that time is to suit the sponsors of the competition, but I certainly won’t be glued to the TV or radio waiting for our next opponent. As good as it was to win last night it was only in the Carabao Cup and it’s of very little importance in the grand scheme of things.

The game against Watford on Saturday is far more important and keeping that winning streak going is of utmost importance. They have started the season well and they’re a point ahead of us, but we could make up some real ground on the pacesetters with Chelsea and Liverpool playing each other on Saturday evening. Hopefully we can get those three points against Watford and continue our progress.

That’s it for today.

See you tomorrow.