Arsenal v Burnley Preview

Arsenal may not have been overly impressive in their 1-0 win at Newcastle last week, but the got the job done and that was of utmost importance. They were rarely bothered in defence and that can’t be a bad thing for a team who only kept one clean sheet in their 19 League games away from home last season. Newcastle didn’t have an awful lot to offer in attack, but that didn’t stop Arsenal conceding to every team in the league except for Watford on their travels last season.

Unai Emery went with quite a few youngsters and fringe players on the day as lack of match fitness among other things deprived him of much of his strongest 11. Mesut Ozil and Sead Kolasinac missed out for security reasons, but thankfully it seems they are clear to play tomorrow and hopefully their “situation” has come to an end. Both Alexandre Lacazette and Lucas Torreira sat the game out while both Nicolas Pepe and Dani Ceballos came off the bench late on. 

Those six players could all reasonably expect to be among the first names on the team sheet and we’re still awaiting the returns of Hector Bellerin and Rob Holding from long term injuries. Both of them would be among the first names on the team sheet too when they return so it looks like the manager will be spoiled for choice with a fully fit squad. I still haven’t mentioned David Luiz and he will be hoping to start tomorrow, but it won’t be easy to shift either Sokratis Papastathopoulos or Callum Chambers considering how comfortable they looked last week.

I have no doubt Burnley will offer more of a challenge to our defence and they certainly like to “put it up ‘em” given the opportunity. Ashley Barnes is a well known wind-up merchant and we can’t allow him to get under our collective skin. They had a very good 3-0 win at home to Southampton last week and Barnes grabbed himself a couple of goals in that game.

If memory serves me correctly Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang is fond of a goal against Burnley and scored twice against them in both of our encounters last season. Whoever the manager brings in I hope he keeps playing Aubameyang through the middle as he’s proven to be a top class goalscorer in any team he has played in. We have a host of players capable of making chances for him and he has the ability to become the top scorer in the Premier League this season.

I wouldn’t be surprised to see Ozil and Kolasinac return while I think a home game is probably the best place to give Pepe his full debut. Either Ceballos or Torreira could come into midfield and the decision on who to leave out could be made easier if Granit Xhaka isn’t passed fit to play. With those changes it won’t really leave room for either Reiss Nelson or Joe Willock in the starting 11 which is harsh on Willock in particular after his performance last week, but I have no doubt we will see plenty of them over the coming season.

I’m not sure if Henrikh Mkhitaryan will keep his place either and he can be a very frustrating player at times. He played a few very good passes last week and we could or maybe should have scored from at least one of them. He had to be the most wayward player on the pitch when it came to passing at times too and it can be tough to see so many passes go astray or the ball lost so often. I’m not sure whether the output or input we get from him matches up with his game time or his incredibly high wages either.

I think, once we work up a head of steam, we will make plenty of chances against a Burnley team who conceded a lot of goals last season. I’m still not too sure exactly what our style is, but with the players available we are more than capable of playing free flowing attractive football while still being able to protect our defence. It’s that defence that’s still the real worry and they need to work on the best understanding they can ahead of two very tough games in the next two weeks.

Hopefully we can put in a performance to build plenty of confidence ahead of a trip to Liverpool and a home game against Spurs. If we can win tomorrow and come through those two games with two points or more I think it will be a pretty good start to the season. 

David Luiz

Henrikh Mkhitaryan 

Aubameyang against Burnley 

Chance to temporarily go top

2 tough games coming up 

That’s it for today.

See you tomorrow.

Arsenal Kick Off The New Season At Newcastle

It’s hard to argue with what’s been a very good transfer window for Arsenal and hopes are relatively high going into the new season. It didn’t start too well with Aaron Ramsey leaving on a free transfer after the season had ended on a low as Arsenal lost the Europa League final to Chelsea as well as failing to finish in the top four. It didn’t look like we would be an attractive destination for any prospective signings with no Champions League football for the third season in a row.

With a couple of weeks to go it didn’t look too good, but the club worked tirelessly and managed to pull off some very good signings. Nicolas Pépé and Dani Ceballos will be real assets to the team even if Ceballos is only on loan for the season while Kieran Tierney looks like he will be a great fit too when he returns from his current injury. I’m still not sure about the deadline day signing of David Luiz, but I’m hoping he can help to improve a defence which badly needs improving.

We also signed Gabriel Martinelli and while he might get a few chances this season he’s definitely seen as one for the future. William Saliba was signed from St. Etienne too, but he’s being loaned back to them for the season as part of the deal and again he’s been bought with the future in mind. Of course it’s important to keep an eye on where we’re going and the future of the club is very important, but from here on it’s how this season goes that matters as our quest to return to the top four begins.

The ongoing situation with both Mesut Ozil and Sead Kolasinac hasn’t helped with both players left out of the squad for “personal reasons” after the attempted carjacking a couple of weeks ago. If the rumours are to be believed there have been further threats to the players and it would be difficult for them to concentrate on football when the scum of the earth are targeting them and those they care about. The sooner the situation is sorted the better and it certainly does say a lot for the state of law and order in London at the moment.

We probably won’t see too many of our new signings from the start today with Pépé still short of match fitness and Luiz only arriving at the club late on Thursday. Tierney is of course injured while Martinelli is unlikely to play which just leaves Ceballos as a contender. I imagine we will see him in the team and he’ll probably play alongside Granit Xhaka in the midfield.

With all of those absences Unai Emery doesn’t have too many choices to make today. I’d be surprised if he included Shkodran Mustafi in the team considering he has told him he can leave the club which would mean we will most likely see Sokratis Papastathopoulos and Callum Chambers in the centre of defence with Ainsley Maitland-Niles and Nacho Monreal as the full backs in a four man defence. With the midfield duo already sorted that will probably leave Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang on one side of the attack with Reiss Nelson on the other and Henrikh Mkhitaryan behind Alexandre Lacazette.

It’s a team more than capable of going to a Newcastle team who have lost their best two players from last season and winning. Newcastle have of course brought in some new players themselves, but they will have to be gradually worked into the team just like our new arrivals. They have a new manager too and it’s up to us to start on the front foot and make sure they don’t have a chance to get a foothold in the game and build some confidence.

I think we will more than likely get a narrow win and I hope to see Pépé come off the bench and make a contribution too. Of all our new players he’s the one I’m looking forward to seeing the most and the one most likely to have a real impact on our season. 

A win is a must for us followed by a home win against Burnley next week before two very difficult games ahead of the first pesky international break of the season. There’s no point in thinking too far ahead though and I’ll be more than happy with three points ahead of that Burnley game and the Liverpool and Spurs games.

That’s it for today.

See you tomorrow.

Arsenal Transfer Latest

With the first friendly of Arsenal’s pre-season just under two weeks away it’s time to take a look at our activity or lack thereof in the transfer market. With an awful lot to be done before the season kicks off in just under seven weeks you would hope the club would already be on top of things, but as always activity seems to be at a minimum. We’ve already seen the exit of a few players when their contracts ended and there’s no doubt a few of the younger players will get a better chance in the first team squad next season.

With Freddie Ljungberg moving from the youth set up to the first team set up it would seem logical that some of those young players who played under him will get a bigger role in the first team. The statement from Raul Sanllehi that we will be returning to “project youth” in some form would also point to those players getting more game time and also to us probably looking at younger and less expensive options in the transfer market too. I’ll attempt to take a look at some of the players Arsenal are interested in and assess their chances of actually playing for Arsenal next season.

First up it has to be Kieran Tierney who is currently the most likely player to be Arsenal’s first signing of this transfer window. If the reports are to be believed we have had our first offer turned down and we came back with a higher offer which still falls short of Celtic’s valuation. This one has a bit to play out yet, but it seems quite likely that we could have a new left back at the club quite soon.

I’m not sure where his arrival would leave Sead Kolasinac and whether we might consider selling a player we got on a free transfer only a couple of seasons ago. It didn’t take us long to turn the best left back in the Bundesliga into a very average defender and I wouldn’t be surprised if we sold Kolasinac to fund other targets. Tierney is certainly a very good prospect who has already played a lot of games for such a young player, but it would be a step up in class from Scottish football to the Premier League and he’s had a few issues with injuries too. Overall I think we might just get our man and I hope he can be one of the defenders we so badly need to improve the team.

Another player who won’t seem to go away is Wilfried Zaha and his abilities would certainly be a real asset to our team. However, our limited funds due to our inability to qualify for the Champions League would most likely rule out our chances of signing a player from another Premier League club considering the prices players of his ilk obtain in domestic transfers. Zaha had an unsuccessful spell at United a few years ago before returning to Palace, but he has grown as a player since then.

Personally I would love to see Zaha in an Arsenal shirt, but I can’t see us being able to afford him or the player wanting to join us for Europa League football next season. If he’s going to leave Palace I think he will probably end up at a club playing in the Champions League and the money changing hands will be far too much for Arsenal’s limited budget. Who knows maybe Stan Kroenke will dip into his very deep pockets to stump up the fee and maybe I’ll win the Euro Millions in the not too distant future.

Florian Thauvin is a player who’s name seems to come up season after season alongside that of Arsenal once the transfer window is open. He might have had a bit of a nightmare when he was a Newcastle player a couple of seasons ago, but he has had very good returns in the last two seasons in France with Marseilles. With the team needing to add some flair in wide areas he certainly looks like he might be one to fit the bill, but like so many other potential targets it comes down to price and availability.

I’m not so sure this one is a runner and we’re probably only hearing his name mentioned because it’s one that’s mentioned in virtually every transfer window. I’m not discounting it either because his stats would point to him possibly making a difference and we really need players who can make a difference at the moment.

The stories relating to Yannick Carrasco seem to have gone a little cold recently and the chances of him returning from China seem remote. He’s a little older than some of our other so called targets, but again he’s a player with the ability to make a difference and that’s probably why we’re interested in him or at least rumoured to be. With his Chinese club saying he’s not for sale and a likely high fee if he was I would be very surprised if there was any chance of him plying his trade at the Emirates Stadium next season.

If we’re still on the look out for a central defender we could certainly do worse than Lewis Dunk, but I just can’t see how he’s an improvement on what we already have. He had a very effective partnership with Shane Duffy for Brighton last season, but it’s a big step up from playing for a relegation threatened team to trying to challenge at the top of the table. Given the money exchanging hands for transfers within the Premier League I can only imagine Brighton would want an absolute fortune for what I see as a fairly average player.

He’s certainly no better than who we have already and I can’t see how his arrival would improve our defence. With our defensive problems in recent seasons we need to bring in players who are better than we have already and I don’t see Dunk fitting into that category.

Dan-Axel Zagadou is a player I can’t admit to knowing too much about, but he’s the latest Borussia Dortmund player to have his name linked with Arsenal. Again he’s a central defender and it’s definitely a position where we need to improve, but I’m not so sure a 20 year old with very little first team experience is what we’re looking for. If the reports are to be believed Dortmund have an over supply of players and could be looking to offload some, but I would be surprised if they were to sell a player who looks like he will probably increase in value quite a lot in the next few years.

They did get him on a free transfer from PSG though so it would be all profit for them if we can afford their asking price. At almost six and a half feet his height would be a welcome addition to our defence and according to reports he played well for France in the recent under 20 World Cup. I would still be very surprised to see him play for any team other than Dortmund next season and I certainly can’t see him making his way to Arsenal.

That’s it for today.

See you tomorrow.

Arsenal v Rennes Preview

After a fairly disastrous night in Rennes last Thursday Arsenal bounced back on Sunday with a 2-0 win against United to move them back to fourth in the Premier League. If they neeeded a confidence boost after that defeat they couldn’t have asked for a better result and it moved them within a point of third placed Spurs too. A top four finish is a very real possibility now providing we can sort out an abysmal run of away results.

We have only won twice in our last 11 away games in all competitions and those wins were against Blackpool and Huddersfield. We should have won away to Spurs a couple of weeks ago though and except for some very poor refereeing and a last minute penalty miss we would have won too. I thought we were pretty much in control of the game away to Rennes last week too until the Sokratis Papastathopoulos red card, but our utter inability to cope when playing with a man down cost us dearly.

The players have the chance to redeem themselves tonight though and it would be quite the redemption with a two goal lead for Rennes to overturn. It’s certainly far from impossible and I’d say our chances are a little less than 50/50, but we have given ourselves an uphill struggle. If we’re going to do it we’re going to have to put in a performance similar to the one against United on Sunday.

I know United had their chances in that game and we rode our luck a few times, but you couldn’t question the attitude and commitment of the players for one moment in the game. Unai Emery made a bold team selection and it paid off for him even if we had a little help from David de Gea and the woodwork. He might need to be just as bold tonight because we need to have enough attacking intent to cause them real problems.

Of course we opened them up at ease in the first leg and we really should have been more than one goal ahead by the time Sokratis got his marching orders. I’m not denying how easily they opened us up when we were down to 10 men, but their defensive abilities offer us real hope for tonight. Hopefully the penalty Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang scored against United can be the catalyst for him to find some form in front of goal again.

His finishing has been below par recently and I know strikers miss chances all the time, but everything about his game is off at the moment. Thankfully Alexandre Lacazette’s suspension was reduced and he can play tonight and I would be very surprised if the manager didn’t play both of our main strikers. They work well together and Lacazette is on a great run of contributing at least a goal or assist in successive games for quite a while now.

If Mesut Ozil gets the nod again he’s the man who can open them up and make the chances for those two as well as getting our wide players in behind them. Speaking of which I wonder if the manager will use three central defenders again and let the wing backs get forward. We create quite a lot of our chances from pull backs when our wide players get behind the opposition and Sead Kolasinac is probably our best player at getting into that position.

If he does use that formation it would probably mean Shkodran Mustafi filling in for the suspended Sokratis and regular readers will know how that makes me feel. He’s an accident waiting to happen in almost every game he plays, but we would have little other choice with that formation tonight. If we play two central defenders and Nacho Monreal gets the nod over Mustafi it would also be a clear message of how the manager rates Mustafi I suppose.

Anyway here’s hoping we can come up with another good performance and result tonight and our home form in the league would suggest it’s certainly well within our capabilities. We have won 13 of our 16 home games in the league this season with only City winning more and we’re currently on a nine game winning streak. In five of our last six home games we would have done enough to either put Rennes out or bring the game to extra time and we need more of the same tonight. I can’t say I’m overly confident of us going through, but I have a nagging feeling we’re not quite done with the Europa League yet this season.

That’s it for today.

See you tomorrow.

Arsenal’s Premier League Trip To West Ham Previewed

Arsenal had a fairly run of the mill 3-0 win away to Blackpool in the third round of the FA Cup last week after beating Fulham 4-1 in the Premier League only a few days earlier. Those games brought an end to a very busy festive schedule which wasn’t great to say the least, but it could have been worse too. The low point was the 5-1 defeat away to Liverpool after scoring first in the game and it showed up just how poor we are defensively even if it wasn’t really a surprise.

We haven’t won in our last four away games and we have now conceded 21 goals away from home in our 10 games this season with only three other teams conceding more away goals. It was our away form which saw us miss out on a top four finish last season with only City taking more points at home and it seems our away form could be heading that way again this season. Our away results were initially quite good this season, but it seems other teams have realised they just need to attack us and the chances will flow. It doesn’t help when we try to sit on a lead because it’s something we are incapable of doing and the only way we’re going to improve our away results is by continuing to attack.

It might only be a trip across London to play West Ham today, but I think it’s a really big game for us. If we’re going to continue to keep a real interest in a top four finish we have to keep pace with Chelsea and try to stay ahead of a rejuvenated United too. We don’t play any of the rest of the top six in our last eight games and we need to get to those games with a top four place still in our sights. It does mean we have to travel to both City and Spurs as well as playing at home to Chelsea and United in our next nine games and it’s going to be difficult to keep our challenge up.

As it stands Chelsea are three points ahead of us and we will draw level if we can beat West Ham before they play Newcastle in the late game today. On the face of it Chelsea should stroll through that game, but they only drew 0-0 at home to struggling Southampton in their last home game and Newcastle don’t actually tend to concede too many goals away from home this season. The chances of Chelsea slipping up will surely increase just a little if we can put some pressure on them by beating West Ham.

United have won all four of their games since they parted ways with Jose Mourinho only a few weeks ago even if those games weren’t against the best teams in the league. They travel to Spurs tomorrow and while I would never wish for Spurs to win any game they could do us a favour by at least taking a point off them. We all know Spurs aren’t real contenders for the title and they will bottle it at some stage, but it is looking increasingly difficult for us to catch them. They are six points behind Liverpool at the moment and we’re a further seven points behind them which probably means we have as much chance of catching them as they have of catching Liverpool.

We had hoped to be able to strengthen the team in the January transfer window, but it seems there is precious little money in the kitty at the moment and we will have to be happy with whatever loanees we might be able to tempt our way. Our need to strengthen the centre of our defence and add some attacking width is clear for all to see and our top four chances could depend on who we can add before the month is over. I’m still not sure how the sixth wealthiest club in the world hasn’t got two pennies to rub together, but I have no doubt it has an awful lot to do with us being the only Premier League club who’s owner doesn’t invest a single cent in the club.

Back to today’s game though and our need for three points against a West Ham team who have lost more home games than they have won and have only kept one clean sheet at home. We haven’t kept a clean sheet away from home either so the chances of both teams scoring today must be pretty high. If it’s a shoot out we do have the joint highest scorer in the league in our ranks and hopefully Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang can be the man to make the difference.

The manager does have some or all of Nacho Monreal, Shkodran Mustafi, Hector Bellerin, Laurent Koscielny and Mesut Ozil available for selection again at least and he will have more options than he has had recently and a few decisions to make too. He has to get his team right and it’s something he has struggled to do in recent weeks, but some of those returning players might make it a little easier for him. He has struggled to get any balance in the team recently and the midfield mix has been wrong far too often. 

The return of Bellerin would give us more attacking options on the right and I imagine we will play three central defenders if both him and Sead Kolasinac play. With our lack of genuine width in the team the two of them will be very important when it comes to getting behind the West Ham defence and cutting the ball back for others to score. That was our best route to goal for the early part of the season and it would be great to fully reopen that route.

I can’t say I’m overly confident of us getting the win today given how we have performed away from home recently, but it’s certainly well within our abilities. If we take the lead and sit back giving the initiative to West Ham it will only go one way so we have to stay on the front foot from the first to the last minute. There’s still plenty to play for this season, but anything other than a win today will make a top four finish an awful harder for us to achieve.

That’s it for today.

See you tomorrow.

Arsenal v Burnley Preview

Arsenal had almost forgotten what defeat was like before last weekend, but successive defeats to Southampton and Spurs have certainly reminded them of how bitter it can taste. Our 22 game unbeaten run came to an end at Southampton in the Premier League last weekend and Spurs added to our misery at home in the Carabao Cup quarter final on Wednesday night. Defeats are a part of football, but there is no doubt we played a huge part in our own downfall in both games.

They need to put those defeats behind them against Burnley and get back to winning ways by any means they can. It’s certainly well within their capabilities even with the team getting more tired with each passing game. The lack of depth in the squad in certain positions is becoming very obvious and it’s something that might have to be addressed in the January transfer window.

There’s little we can do about it at the moment though and the early kick off against Burnley gives the players little time to recover from the defeat against Spurs on Wednesday night. Unai Emery played more or less the strongest team he had available in that game and that could come back to haunt him over the busy festive season. After Burnley we face trips to Brighton and Liverpool before we play at home to Fulham and those four games take place in just 10 days.

Laurent Koscielny wasn’t risked from the start against Spurs and it was understandable given that he has just returned from a long term injury. Nacho Monreal played in that game and he’s just back from injury too while Stephan Lichsteiner wasn’t risked having picked up a knock in the defeat at Southampton. The chances are the three of them will have to start against Burnley with Shkodran Mustafi and Sead Kolasinac both doubtful and they have a combined age of 99 years. 

At least Sokratis Papastathopoulos is available to play in the centre of the defence and we can only hope the manager doesn’t decide to deploy Granit Xhaka there too. Not only is it not his natural position, but we miss his influence in midfield too much when he plays in defence. Xhaka and Lucas Torreira have formed a very good partnership in the centre of our midfield and it’s something that has to be allowed to grow.

On top of our defensive woes it appears Mesut Ozil is “persona non grata” with the manager and his days at the club could well be numbered. If that is the case it’s not going to be easy to move on a player on his wages who signed a lengthy contract extension less than a year ago. I hope he can sort things out with the manager, but it doesn’t look that way at the moment. Ozil is an incredibly talented player who can help us win against any team and we will suffer without his creative talents if he continues to be left out of the team. As the games come quick and fast I suppose it will become more obvious if the manager doesn’t want him or not.

I thought Henrikh Mkhitaryan played quite well against Spurs with the exception of the great chance he missed to put us ahead shortly before they scored and he could find himself playing a more important role if Ozil doesn’t play. The Aaron Ramsey situation is less complicated than Ozil’s and he will play at times, but it appears we will lose him too. It appears two of our most talented midfielders will be plying their trade elsewhere next season or even next month and it could leave a gaping hole in our squad.

Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang seems to have been given the nod as first choice striker and he has scored the goals to deserve that role, but he has missed his fair share in the last few games. I wouldn’t be surprised if the manager decided to rotate him against Burnley with Alexandre Lacazette the obvious candidate to replace him. Aubameyang has had a great impact off the bench when he hasn’t started this season and that could be the case again against Burnley.

We couldn’t really ask for a better opponent as we try to get three previous points in our pursuit of a top four finish. Burnley have only taken one point in their last five away games and they failed to score in four of those games. They have tightened up in defence in the last few weeks, but only two teams have conceded more goals away from home. They’re in the relegation zone at the moment and we’re not going to convince anyone we can keep our challenge for a top four finish going if we can’t beat them.

If we’re going to keep that challenge going we are going to have to start playing well in the first half of games at some stage. The last two games have shown we can’t always depend on our second halves of games to get us out of trouble and we need to do better from the start. It’s quite incredible that we haven’t led any of our 17 Premier League games so far at half time and I think today has to offer an ideal opportunity to end that statistic.

We have tough trips to Brighton and Liverpool coming in quick succession, but we can only concentrate on the job in hand against Burnley. I think we will win, but if we don’t it could make the rest of the festive schedule very difficult for us.

That’s it for today.

See you tomorrow.

Arsenal’s Trip To AC Milan Previewed

The last few weeks have been even tougher than usual in what has been a very tough season for Arsenal. We’ve lost the Carabao Cup Final to City, lost our last three league games and even lost at home to Ostersund in the second leg of the last round of the Europa League. We did progress despite that defeat though and that leaves us with a last 16 tie with AC Milan which starts with the first leg in Milan tonight.

We go into the game devoid of any form after four defeats in a row and with performances that seem to get progressively worse with each game. Our only remaining route to success this season is the Europa League and winning it is the only way we will qualify for the Champions League next season too. That might seem like an incredibly unlikely scenario at the moment, but it’s one we have to hope can occur.

To make matters worse Alexandre Lacazette is injured for tonight and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang is ineligible so our striking options are severely limited. Danny Welbeck is the most likely candidate for the role, but to say he has been poor since his latest return from injury is a massive understatement and I just don’t think he’s up to the task. There is a train of thought that young Eddie Nketiah might get the nod and it’s a choice I think might just be bold enough to pay off, but I would be very surprised if Arsene Wenger chose anyone other than Welbeck to play up front.

Both Hector Bellerin and Aaron Ramsey were rested for the debacle at Brighton on Sunday although Bellerin did come on late on and I would imagine we will see both of them in from the start tonight. With Nacho Monreal injured it means Sead Kolasinac will probably play on the left unless Ainsley Maitland-Niles plays, but he seems to have fallen out of favour since he got 45 minutes in his favoured central midfield role against Ostersund a couple of weeks ago. David Ospina will be back in his usual goalkeeping role for cup games and he surely can’t do much worse than Petr Cech did against Brighton. 

I would like to see us set out to keep things tight like we did away to Chelsea in the league and the Carabao Cup. That tactic worked well in both games when we came out with two respectable 0-0 draws and that would be a perfectly acceptable result tonight. If we’re going to do that tonight the players will have to work their socks off and that’s something that we haven’t seen far too often this season.

We have it in us though and we have to hope the players realise this is their only hope of any glory this season and can raise their game accordingly. If they can work hard and give their all from first minute to last the result will be a lot more acceptable no matter what it is. Even a one goal defeat would leave us still in the tie ahead of the second leg next week and we have a pretty good record at home this season despite our recent results.

It’s an awful lot to expect from players who have let us down time after time, but as a fan you need that hope and you never want your team to lose no matter what. The manager has seemed utterly incapable of getting his players up for games or of changing things in game when it’s not working, but he has to try to influence their performance tonight somehow. We have had some fantastic away wins in Europe under Wenger over the years and tonight would be the perfect time for another one. I have little to no expectation of a good result, but I will always live in hope until the players prove me wrong at least.

That’s it for today.

See you tomorrow.

Arsenal V Ostersund Preview

Things are a little odd at the moment for us Arsenal fans with a game last Thursday night and another game tonight, but no weekend game in between. The FA Cup exit to Forest was the reason we didn’t play last weekend and our sojourn in the Europa League is the reason for a season interspersed with Thursday night football. There’s still a way to go in the Europa League, but if we can finish the job we started last week we will at least be through to the last 16.

After a 3-0 win in Sweden last week we have a great advantage going into tonight’s second leg. Last week’s game wasn’t exactly a classic, but the 3-0 win leaves us nicely set up to progress to the last 16 where we can probably expect a tougher opponent. That doesn’t mean tonight is a forgone conclusion, but anything other than Arsenal progressing to the next round would be a disaster at this stage.

With the Carabao Cup Final against City on Sunday you would expect Arsene Wenger to rest whatever players he can tonight. I would be surprised to see Laurent Koscielny, Mesut Ozil and Nacho Monreal in the team, but otherwise I think he will pick a strong enough team. Ostersund gave it a go when they went 2-0 down last week, but even a team without those three players should be too strong for them.

The manager has been talking Danny Welbeck up ahead of the game and it’s another chance for him to show what he can do. His career at Arsenal has been severely hampered by injuries and he’s just back from the latest of those. He has shown promise at times, but I’m not sure he’s at the level we require going forward.

With Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang ineligible and Alexandre Lacazette injured he’s our best option in the Europa League unless Eddie Nketiah was to be given a shot. He certainly looks like he could be the future of the club and the game tonight might just be a big chance for him. Maybe Welbeck will start in a wider role with Nketiah through the middle, but I doubt it as much as I might want to see it happen. 

I can’t see Aaron Ramsey playing either as he’s only just returning from injury and I suspect everything will be done to make sure he is available for Sunday. It will be interesting to see whether it’s him or Jack Wilshere selected to play alongside Granit Xhaka agsinst City. I think we will get another look at Ainsley Maitland-Niles in midfield tonight and maybe we might even see the elusive Sead Kolasinac at left back.

David Ospina will be in goal again and he will more than likely play there on Sunday too. Whatever about rotating our keepers or giving Ospina a chance in cup games I think we have to play our strongest team in a cup final. It’s a decision which could cost us dearly on Sunday (unless it goes to penalties), but I would be very surprised if Ospina didn’t play.

To be honest tonight is a game we really want to get out of the way with the minimum fuss so we can concentrate on Sunday. The Carabao Cup might not be the biggest trophy in terms of credibility, but it’s our best chance of a trophy this season at this stage. The Europa League still offers another chance, but we will have a long way to go after tonight just to reach the final and an awful lot of good teams stand in our way.

That’s it for today.

See you tomorrow.

Arsenal’s Trip To Ostersund Previewed

With our hopes of a top four finish this season almost finished it’s time for Arsenal to get back to Europa League action with a trip to Sweden in the first leg of their last 32 tie. The Europa League has become an awful lot more important now with the top four almost gone as the winner gains qualification for next season’s Champions League. As it stands it’s definitely our best route to Europe’s premier club competition for next season despite some very good teams standing in our way.

On the face of it we are huge favourites to progress over two legs and even to win this evening. The trouble comes when you look at our away form this season and our inability to overcome any sort of meaningful challenge on the road. When a game starts to go agsinst us away from home we seem unable to find any answers and change the game.

Arsene Wenger seems to realise the importance of the Europa League at this stage in our season and we won’t see a team of reserves and fringe players as we did in the group games. We should see our strongest team today with no game this weekend and it would be ideal if we could put the tie to bed today considering what next week holds. We have the return leg this day week and a Carabao Cup Final date with City only three days later. It would be great to be able to rest some players ahead of that game, but the Europa League is a more important competition.

New boy Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang isn’t eligible today and Alexandre Lacazette has undergone knee surgery which will keep him out for up to six weeks. It looks like the only real option up front is Danny Welbeck with Eddie Nketiah a possibility from the bench too. I’ve never been overly impressed by Welbeck, but he has the chance in these two games to show what he can do after his most recent return from injury. 

If the manager is going to play a strong team he will still be tempted to play David Ospina in goal. As over the hill as Petr Cech might be I still think he is far superior to Ospina, but I would be tempted to sub Ospina in if any tie goes to penalties considering it is going on seven years since Cech saved one I believe. I think we will see Ospina in goal tonight though and I just hope he remembers to stand in front of his line rather than behind it as he so often does. 

I think we might have the ideal opportunity today to reintroduce Sead Kolasinac to the team and maybe even play Ainsley Maitland-Niles in his preferred midfield role too. Ostersund have had a meteoric rise through the leagues in Sweden, but they will have to do something very special to live with us as long as we keep our heads and play the right way. We have only two European trophies to our name and it would be far from bad to give ourselves a chance of adding to that tally.

That’s it for today.

See you tomorrow.

Arsenal v Chelsea Preview

The Festive Programme hasn’t gone too well for Arsenal so far as they have lost a little ground on the other teams chasing a top four spot this season. They have only won two of their seven league games since the start of December, but alternatively you could say they are unbeaten in six league games. It depends on how you look at it I suppose, but personally I think the current spate of draws does not auger well for us.

We drew away to Southampton, West Ham and West Brom and all three of them are struggling at the wrong end of the table. While the point at Southampton was welcome as we hardly deserved it we should have taken full points against West Ham and West Brom. We can point at the referee all we want for the ridiculous last minute penalty he gave West Brom, but we didn’t create enough good chances in either game for my liking.

The draw with Liverpool was a trifle fortunate too as we were awful that day except for the five minute spell where we got our three goals. A return of 10 points from seven games isn’t going to keep pace with those chasing a top four finish and we need to turn some of those draws into wins. I commented earlier this season on how the amount of defeats we had suffered was being offset by not drawing other games, but now it seems we have lost the knack of winning tight games.

Speaking of tight games the game with Chelsea should be just that and we really need to come out on top. Our home record so far this season has been very good with eight wins  in our 10 games, but the two games we didn’t win were against teams above us. We conceded three goals against both United and Liverpool at home and we cannot concede that many agsinst Chelsea or we will lose.

We have big problems with injuries going into the game with Nacho Monreal, Sead Kolasinac, Aaron Ramsey, Olivier Giroud and of course Santi Cazorla definitely out and Laurent Koscielny almost definitely out too. Mesut Ozil is still a doubt too and it leaves us with what could best be described as a depleted team. Arsene Wenger has some big decisions to make before the game and those decisions could have a big impact on our display and the result.

I’d take a draw if you offered it to me right now even though we badly need the three points. Chelsea won’t be far from full strength and they had the luxury of leaving Eden Hazard out of their 5-0 stroll against Stoke on Saturday. They have had a day longer to recover and that can make a difference at such a busy time in the season. So many factors point to Chelsea getting the upper hand in this game and we will have to be at our very best to get anything from it.

Speaking of which it’s been a very long time since we were at our best against anybody and doing so with so many players out is a huge ask of those who will play. I hope Ozil is fit because we lacked so much creativity against West Brom without him and Alexis Sanchez tried to drop back and fill that role, but we need Alexis in a more advanced role getting on to passes from Ozil. Whatever our issues might be with two players who will not sign contracts they are still the best players we have.

I would assume the manager will go with three at the back and that would mean Ainsley Maitland-Niles coming in on the left and either Per Mertesacker or Rob Holding as one of the three central defenders if Koscielny doesn’t play. We coped with similar problems defensively against Chelsea when we beat them in the Cup Final in May, but we had more attacking options in that game. We need to get our midfield spot on tonight and that’s a difficult task with the personnel we have available. A win is not beyond us though, but it will take one of those once or twice in a season barnstorming performances we used get so regularly in the past to get the three points. 

On a side note the manager looks like he will probably get a stadium ban for his comments about and to the referee after the West Brom game. I know there are many who would like to see him permanently banned from the stadium, but I can’t see it being of much benefit. I can understand his reaction, but did he really think his comments to the media and the referee would go unpunished and you have to think he is feeling the pressure of expectation. 

When he extended his contract in May or June there were promises of taking the club forward and building for the future, but it’s surely clear to one and all that we’re heading in the opposite direction. For me the only solution is changing the manager because the ownership won’t change and even if it did I can’t see how that would improve what the manager does now. He was a great manager in his day, but for me that day has well and truly passed and if he loves the club as much as he professes to he should open his eyes and do what is best for the club.

That’s it for today.

See you tomorrow.

Arsenal v Liverpool Preview

Arsenal at least managed to get a win under their belts last week when they beat Newcastle to put an end to a run of three league games without a win. They followed that win up with the reserves putting West Ham out of the Carabao Cup on Tuesday night and lining up a two-legged semi final with Chelsea next month. On the plus side they didn’t concede a goal in any of those games or the league game previous to the Newcastle game when they drew 0-0 away to West Ham.

As it stands we’re fifth in the league and only a point behind Liverpool going into this game against them and any place up as far as second is there to play for. If we’re going to have a chance of catching the teams above us our away form is going to have to drastically improve and our home form has to hold too. That home form is what is keeping us in touch with the top four with eight wins from nine games and the defeat to United as the only blotch on our copybook.

We have already won at home to Spurs and both Chelsea and City have to visit us too. The results in those games will go a long way to deciding our fate this season and we need to get the three points in the first of them tonight. The defeat at City a few weeks ago didn’t seem to do any damage to our confidence, but the hone defeat to United seems to have had an effect on the players. They need to put that behind them tonight and put in a performance that shows that not only can they finish in the top four, but also that they believe they can do it.

As good as our results have been at home the performances haven’t always matched them and Liverpool are a team who can and will take advantage of any slips tonight. They have won their last four away games and scored 16 goals in those victories, but none of them were against teams as good as Arsenal. They have conceded a lot of goals away from home this season and that has to give us plenty of hope for tonight.

In the reverse fixture back in August we were absolutely awful and probably more than a little lucky to only lose 4-0. The team was all wrong that day and so was the attitude from far too many players, but we won’t see the same team tonight for a few reasons. Having said that I would expect only four changes from that team despite having most of our squad to pick from.

The notable absentees are Shkodran Mustafi and Aaron Ramsey with Olivier Giroud injured too and of course Santi Cazorla has been out for more than a year now. Arsene Wenger picked his team to accommodate Alec Oxlade-Chamberlain that day and he repaid him with an awful performance and by joining Liverpool almost immediately after the match. His inclusion at right wing back meant Hector Bellerin played on the left while Alexandre Lacazette was left on the bench with other new boy Sead Kolasinac.

Things seem to have gone full circle for Kolasinac already as he now appears to be out of favour again as Ainsley Maitland-Niles looks to be the most likely choice at right back. If the team picked in the Carabao Cup is anything to go by then AMN will get the nod and Kolasinac will sit on the bench. If he’s not carrying an injury it’s a slap in the face for a player who was voted the best left back in the Bundeslige last season.

It would be a great opportunity for AMN, but also a risky move from the manager and I hope it doesn’t backfire if he does play. Ultimately he looks like he could be the player we need to bolster the centre of the midfield, but he’s been broken into the team in a position that isn’t his best one. He has done well there in the lower level games he has played there this season, but marking the top scoring player in the Premier League so far this season will be a very tough task for him.

At least we will get to see Lacazette from the start and again if Tuesday’s game is anything to go by we will see Alex Iwobi too. The absence of Ramsey should see Jack Wilshere in from the start too and it would be great to see him have a real influence in such a big game. With his contract up at the end of the season he is playing for his Arsenal future and making an impact tonight would go a long way to convincing the club he has something to offer.

A win tonight would be a huge boost and I think we are more than capable of it, but we really cannot afford to lose either. Besides the three points on offer a defeat could be another huge dent in our confidence with three games coming up in quick succession. A bad run in those games would be detrimental to our top four hopes and we need to start them in a positive fashion.

Mesut Ozil is the player most likely to open Liverpool up on current form and we need another star performance from him tonight. It would be great if Alexis Sanchez could step up to the plate too, but his form has been patchy at best this season. I have no doubt he will be plying his trade elsewhere next season and I only hope he can give us something in his last few months at the club starting tonight.

Liverpool are a little like Arsenal in so far as they have the ability to fall apart just when everything seems to be going their way. If we can put them to the sword tonight we can maybe cause them a few troubles over the next few games and move well ahead of them in the league. We will move up to fourth if we win tonight and Christmas will look just a little better if we are in the top four.

That’s it for today.

See you tomorrow.

Arsenal v Bournemouth Preview

It's been almost two weeks since Arsenal played thanks to the international break and those two weeks have seemed like an eternity. That last game was an unmitigated disaster when Liverpool destroyed a disinterested Arsenal 4-0 and we were probably lucky it was only 4-0. Since then we've had the shambles of an end to thr transfer window and the pressure on the manager has already reached higher heights than at any time last season.

Last season was our worst league finish since Arsene Wenger took charge in 1996 and like so many I thought it was the ideal time for him to go with his contract up and yet another FA Cup in the bag. He convinced himself to sign on again though with the belief that he could return the team to the glory days of his first 10 years at the club. That hasn't started so well though with two defeats in our first three games and team selections and performances that beggar belief.

Of course those performances don't really beggar belief as we've seen them too often before, but the team selections were more than puzzling. I have no doubt Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain was accommodated to try to convince him to stay at the club, but that didn't work out as he is now a Liverpool player and I don't think he will be missed too much.

After seven years at the club he had never made himself a first team regular and never made a position his own. My only issue with his sale is how late it was done and the fact that we didn't come up with a replacement. The emergence of Reiss Nelson could negate Chamberlain's departure, but it remains to be seen whether he will get the call up to the first team and if he can make that step up.

The three central defender's that the manager switched to late last season isn't looking so good now and the consensus is it might be ditched today. If we do switch to a back four again we might see a player sitting in front of them to shield them from nasty teams who try to attack us and exploit our weaknesses and tactical nativity. The most obvious choice would be Francis Coquelin who played in that role when he broke into the team a few years ago and he's certainly more suited to it than Mohamed Elneny.

Whatever formation we go with we quite simply have to play both Alexander Lacazette and Sead Kolasinac from the start and the decision to leave them out against Liverpool was ridiculous. Kolasinac was voted the best left back in the Bundesliga last season and Lacazette is supposedly the striker we have needed for far too many years now. If we going to have any chance of making headway in the Premier League this season we need to play our strongest team in every game.

We don't have to worry about upcoming Champions League games with only the Europa League to play in and the teams we are chasing are all playing in the Champions League. I would be very surprised if we didn't play a weakened team against Cologne on Thursday night with a trip to Chelsea in the league next Sunday. After our bad start we need to consolidate and anything other than a defeat at Chelsea next week would be a great result. 

All that depends on today of course and it goes without saying that we have to win today and win well too. If we don't put on a performance that shows we can play and play well today then it's a very bad sign. As bad as the results and performances against Liverpool and Stoke were they were both away from home. We're at home today and we just have to put a performance to warm the fans and show we are still a force to be reckoned with.

Our away form went to pieces after Christmas last season and while it did improve towards the end of the season we ended up missing out on the Champions League thanks to that away form. Our home form still held up with only one defeat after the opening day last season and it has to hold up again this season. As bad as our start has been, Bournemouth's has been worse with three defeats out of three and only one goal scored.

We need to go at them at full pelt from the first minute and punish their mistakes. There is no place for taking it slowly and letting the game develop. If we attack them from the start I think the goals will come and I think we should be looking to win with a few goals to spare.

I heard both Charlie Nicholas and Phil Neville on the TV last night saying they think Everton will finish ahead of Arsenal and they think the best we can do is seventh. It's very early to write off a team with our talent and with the amount of goals we can score and I hope the players can use those opinions to galvanise them and make them play better. I hope that will start today, but I suppose it's only hope when you consider what we have seen so far this season. I do think we will win today though and I think will score three goals at least, but the real tests will come next week and as the season progresses.

That's it for today.

See you tomorrow.

Pathetic Arsenal Collapse At Liverpool

Things went from bad to worse for Arsenal yesterday when they lost their second game of the season away to Liverpool. Whatever can be said about the defeat at Stoke last week and how big refereeing decisions went against us there can be no such excuses offered yesterday. Arsenal were awful from first minute to last and didn't muster a single attempt on target for the first time in three years.

I thought the team selection at Stoke was all wrong and we were treated to more of the same yesterday. New signings Alexander Lacazette and Sead Kolasinac were left on the bench with Laurent Koscielny and Alexis Sanchez making their first appearances of the season after suspension and injury respectively kept them out of the team until now. The defence was where Arsene Wenger decided to make his strange selections yet again.

Rob Holding came back into the team after being left out of the squad last week while Shkodran Mustafi dropped to the bench. There are rumors of an impending departure for Mustafi and maybe that's why he was on the bench, but to be honest who knows. Holding was part of the central defensive trio along with Koscielny and Nacho Monreal with the really strange decisions in the wing back roles again.

With the manager unable to decide who should play at right wing back he opted for Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Hector Bellerin was played on the left. Never mind that we bought the player voted the best left back in the Bundesliga last season and still haven't given him a chance to show why he won that accolade. Neither Bellerin or Chamberlain should be played on the left, but it seems the manager is the only person unable to see it.

With no central midfielders added to the squad this summer there wasn't much choice in that area and it meant Granit Xhaka and Aaron Ramsey were paired together again. It's a pairing that might possibly work at home to weaker teams, but away to Liverpool it was a recipe for disaster. Ramsey plays too far forward and Xhaka is giving too many goals away right now and both of them lived up to those expectations yet again.

I'm still struggling to understand how Danny Welbeck was chosen ahead of our record signing Lacazette. Welbeck will give you loads of energy and make plenty of runs, but his finishing just isn't up to standard. When the first chance of the game came his way early on he fluffed his lines and it was probably Arsenal's best chance of the game.

Things got decidedly worse for Arsenal very soon after that miss when another lazy Xhaka pass was intercepted and Liverpool went ahead. With Ramsey and Chamberlain a long way off and not even looking at the ball we were caught out of position. A quick cross came in from our left and Frimino was completely unmarked as he headed home.

We should have already been one down by then, but Petr Cech made a good save and he was probably our best player on the day. It's not a good day for the team when they lose 4-0 and their goalkeeper is their best player. It looked like we might make it to half time only one goal down, but in true Arsenal style we let in another goal five minutes before the break.

The second goal came from yet another turnover and that seems to be the pattern for so many of the goals we concede at the moment. We lost the ball on the edge of their box and within 10 seconds we were two behind as Sadio Mane scored from the edge of our box without a single tackle being made as Liverpool went forward. We reached the break lucky to be only two down and the manager had a huge amount of work to do to try to get us back into the game. He brought Francis Coquelin on for Ramsey, but it didn't make any difference at all.

Yet again their next goal came from a turnover and this time it was an Arsenal corner. The ball was cleared by Liverpool and Bellerin was the last man back 20 yards inside their half. His poor touch let Mohamed Salah in and he ran from his own half and finished with ease past Cech. At 3-0 the game was only going one way and it was a matter of how many Liverpool would get at that stage.

The fourth goal came from Daniel Sturridge with a little more than 10 minutes to go and for once it wasn't the immediate result of a turnover. It was still very poor from Arsenal, but at least they had to work just a little bit for the goal for a change. Thankfully it was the last goal of the day and we just had to wait for the final whistle to end the torture.

Where do you start to analyse what happened and how long would that analysis take. For a start the team selection was all wrong and it's obvious that the manager has no real belief in playing three central defenders. As soon as we need to chase a game he switches to a back four, but surely if he believed in the new formation he would stick to it. His continued insistence on playing players out of position and playing some players while better ones are sitting on the bench is inexplicable. 

He went to Liverpool yesterday and played right into their hands from the very first minute. Liverpool knew we would try to come at them and they sat and waited to pick us off on the break or from quick turnovers of our mistakes. It was all too predictable and yet the only man who never considered that it might happen or knew it would was our manager.

For me the blame lies squarely with him and while the players also have to shoulder some responsibility they are his players going out there and playing his tactics. He's the man charged with preparing them for the game and getting them ready mentally, physically and technically, but he admitted afterwards that they weren't ready in any of those aspects. He has to take responsibility for such an abject performance from a team he thinks can challenge for the title.

He got the perfect opportunity to leave on a high after our record breaking FA Cup exploits last season even if he didn't bring Champions League football for once. A new man could have rebuilt without the pressure of Europe's top competition and he would have left plenty of fond memories even if the last 10 years were nowhere near the first 10. What we're left with now is a team who genuinely look like they couldn't be bothered playing for him again while he has two years left on his contract and we all know he never walks away from a contract.

There's no time to bring anyone else in and the players a new manager might want with only 72 hours left in the transfer window. We can't get rid of the players that are no longer needed and far too many of our players are running their contracts down so they can leave for nothing at the end of this season or next. It's an absolute shambles and we have no choice but to watch the man who's in charge continue with his policies which just are not working.

In any other walk of life failure to learn from your mistakes would mean the end, but at Arsenal there are no consequences for the manager or the players. We are habitually handed thrashings and yet we are still told the club were unable to find anyone better to manage the team. I find that unacceptable and I still think we could at least make a go of the Europa League this season, but not with Arsene Wenger in charge.

That doesn't mean I'm going to abuse the man on social media or spend all of my time slating him. I will continue to support the club I have always supported for the last 47 years and nothing will change that, but I genuinely believe we will not move forward until there is a change in management. The next two years could be a long time or maybe I'm completely wrong and he will get it right again, but that scenario is looking less and less likely with every single game.

That's it for today.

See you tomorrow.

Arsenal's Trip To Stoke City Previewed

Arsenal got their season off to a winning start with a crazy roller coaster ride of a win at home to Leicester last week. With 10 minutes to go they were 3-2 down, but the strength of the bench paid off with Aaron Ramsey and Olivier Giroud scoring the goals to win the points. I could spend a long time going into the merits of our defending or lack thereof, but it was important to start the season with three points.

Arsene Wenger had to play a makeshift defence in that game with the three central positions taken by two left backs and a relative novice. Injuries and suspensions left him with no real options on the day, but his options will increase for the trip to Stoke. Laurent Koscielny won't be available as he serves the last game of his suspension, but Shkodran Mustafi and Per Mertesacker are both pushing for a starting place. 

I would expect Mustafi to play and Mertesacker might get the nod, but he has a few awkward choices to make elsewhere too. The chances are Hector Bellerin will continue on the right with a straight choice between Sead Kolasinac and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain on the left. I think Kolasinac has to play there considering how good he has looked already, but I have a feeling he might be deployed as a central defender again to keep Chamberlain in the team.

With only a year to run on his contract Chamberlain is in demand and there is talk of Arsenal cashing in on his value before they lose him on a free transfer next summer if he doesn't sign a new contract. I think he's more or less a nailed on starter until at least the transfer window closes, but I'm not so sure it's the best thing for the team. I can remember Granit Xhaka having to bide his time after arriving last summer and it could well be the same with Kolasinac.

Speaking of Xhaka his name is now one of the first ones on the team sheet and it's a matter of who plays alongside him. For me it has to be Ramsey after he looked so dangerous when he came off the bench last week. I think he was only on the bench because he was carrying a slight knock and I would be surprised if he didn't start at Stoke.

The other big decision to make is who makes up the attacking trio along with Mesut Ozil and Alexander Lacazette. Giroud got a great late winner last week and it might earn him a starting place, but I think he's doing his best work when he comes off the bench. His contribution in defensive set pieces against Stoke could be important and it might just see him in the team. Danny Welbeck did well last week and got his name on the scoresheet, but this game could be more suited to Giroud's skill set.

Until last season we had a poor record at Stoke, but that changed with a 4-1 win up there. We were cruising at 2-0 until a handball goal got them back into the game and we nearly crumbled under the pressure before adding two more goals for a comfortable victory in the end. That man Giroud got two of those goals and again that could be a factor in the manager selecting the team. In all of this I'm assuming Alexis Sanchez is still "injured" and he won't be available.

Stoke lost 1-0 at Everton last week and they haven't exactly set the world alight with their exploits in the transfer market. The loss of Marco Arnautovic was a real blow for them and expectations aren't too high for this season. Besides playing Arsenal they also have games against United, Chelsea and City early on in what looks like a tough start to the season for them.

Anything they can get from today would be a real bonus for them and I have no doubt they will be up to their usual antics to try to disrupt us. Other teams might pressure the ball and target our dodgy looking defence, but Stoke simply like to put the boot in and it's very rare for referees to even consider punishing them. The one time they were properly dealt with it was only because Ramsey had his leg shattered and he's still a villain to their fans because he wasn't happy with almost having his career ended by Ryan Shawcross. He was a mere 19 year old at the time and the songs they still sing to him to this day are nothing short of a disgrace.

Such is the way with football though and you can't expect more from a club like Stoke or the Neanderthals that support them. The only way to shut them up is to put goals on the board and give them the sort of beating we gave them last season. It's something we're capable of doing if we can get our game right and I really hope we do.

I have no doubt Stoke won't get the better of Kolasinac and he's more than strong enough to stand up to them. I've already said Giroud's strength might be needed and I don't think Xhaka will shirk away from them either. It could be a real eye opener for Alexander Lacazette and I hope he will be up to the task and continue on from where he left off last week.

The three points last week were important, but we need to follow them up with three points against Stoke before we go to Liverpool next week. If we are going to challenge for the title this season it's vital to take three points against the lesser sides in the league and I think Stoke fit into that category. I'm not so sure our squad as it is can challenge, but with the right start and the confidence it might bring you never know.

We're certainly a team with a lot of goals in us and we can do better than last season if we can tighten things up at the back. We've being saying that for a long time now though and the signs last week were far from encouraging, but it was far from our first choice defence too. I have no doubt we will improve at the back when Koscielny comes back next week, but until then we need to defend as best as we can today.

In other news we have sold Gabriel Paulista to Valencia as the summer clear out is finally getting underway. There are rumors of the possible sale of Mustafi too, but I can't imagine we will sell him too unless we have someone like Virgil can Dijk lined up. Our current options in central defence aren't so good that we can afford to offload Mustafi without having a top class replacement absolutely certain to sign. There are other players we need to offload first and I would be surprised to see Mustafi go.

That's it for today.

See you tomorrow.

Arsenal v Leicester City Preview

Was it just me or did the summer seem to drag out longer than usual as we waited patiently for the new football season to come around. It makes it's return tonight when Arsenal play at home to Leicester and I can't wait for the game even if it is on a Friday night. I still can't say I think Friday night league football is a good idea, but Arsenal did have their greatest ever victory on a Friday night back on May 26th 1989.

Transfer activity has stalled for Arsenal since the arrival of Alexandre Lacazette with him and Sead Kolasinac the only arrivals so far. As difficult as it has been to buy new players it's been even harder to offload players and we have a squad that looks too big if that's possible. Even with a squad that looks too big we still have a few issues and time is running out with a top class central midfielder needed as soon as possible.

At the moment our options in the centre of the park are limited with Aaron Ramsey and Granit Xhaka as the first choice duo and Mohamed Elneny, Francis Coquelin, Jack Wilshere and Santi Cazorla in reserve. Cazorla is injured with no certain return date while Wilshere is never too far away from his next injury and the chances of Ramsey not missing a large chunk of the season through injury are slim. Coquelin is injured at the moment and even when he returns he is limited in what he can do while Arsene Wenger showed virtually no trust in Elneny in the second half of last season and is rumoured to be willing to let him leave if the right offer comes in.

That leaves an awful lot of pressure on Xhaka and hopefully his disciplinary record can improve this season. He struggled to adjust to the Premier League for much of last season, but I think we will see a better player this season who is more clued into this league and who will also be utilised better by the manager. We need to bring in a player who can fit in with either Xhaka or Ramsey, but who he is and what he will cost is another matter.

Anyway I digress and I should be looking at the game with Leicester tonight and the team which we will be playing. Alexis Sanchez will miss out because of a slight knock he picked up before the Community Shield if you believe what we are told, but the smart money might be on him "making himself unavailable"as he pushes to leave the club. I hope that's not the case, but I have a horrible feeling that's exactly what's happening.

Laurent Koscielny is suspended so that's another one of our first choice players unavailable with Gabriel Paulista, Cazorla and Coquelin obviously out too. There are real doubts over Mesut Ozil, Ramsey, Per Mertesacker and Shkodran Mustafi too and suddenly it looks like we're struggling to put out a strong team. We haven't started well in recent seasons and we need to get three points on the board.

Without all of those players the manager will have to get a little creative and play both Nacho Monreal and Kosalinac as part of the three central defenders. That would leave Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain as the left wing back and Hector Bellerin on the right with young Rob Holding as the third central defender. It's certainly a makeshift defence in the centre in particular and those players are going to have to be switched on for every minute of the game. 

The rest of the team would probably be the same as it was in the Community Shield and we played well against Chelsea, but it wasn't a competitive game in the true sense. The pace against Leicester will be a lot faster and the tackles a lot harder too with no quarter asked or given. I can't remember the last time we looked prepared for the opening game of the season and that's something that needs to change.

Leicester have some injury problems of their own and they will want to get the season off to a good start too after a very disappointing season last season. They didn't exactly defend their title from the previous season too well, but they did recover when Craig Shakespeare replaced Claudio Ranieri and managed to finish twelvth. With no European distractions this season they will at least want to put some pressure on the teams chasing for those European places.

With the rest of the games not taking place until Saturday and Sunday we have a chance of showing everyone else what we can do before they play. With the right attitude and concentration we should be too good for Leicester once we arrive ready to play. It's going to be a long hard season and the league can't be won in August, but it certainly can be lost by the end of September.

Usually by now I should have written my season preview, but in recent seasons there has been no point in writing it until the transfer window has closed. I can't see this season being any different with so many possible changes to our squad and to other clubs too. With a dreaded international break at the end of the month it seems like the perfect opportunity to write my preview and hopefully it can be a fairly positive one.

At the moment I'm somewhere in between positive and negative and it seems to change by the day. I don't think we can win the league with our current squad and that's really what it's all about, but that could change with the right additions and if Alexis stays. I do think we can and will beat Leicester and I just hope I'm proven right.

That's it for today.

See you tomorrow.

Arsenal v Chelsea: Community Shield Preview

It's not quite the return of real football today, but a game between the Premier League champions and the FA Cup Winners is probably the next best thing. Keeping that in mind this is still more or less a pre season friendly and it certainly doesn't count as a trophy despite some United fans considering it as the first leg of their "treble" last season. It's always nice to win a game and lift a trophy at Wembley, but it will count for nothing come next Friday night when the real thing gets going.

We've done well in the Community Shield in recent seasons having won it in 2014 against City and 2015 against today's opponents Chelsea. Despite all the hype of beating Chelsea a couple of seasons ago and putting the Mourinho hoodoo to bed we still started our league campaign badly with a 2-0 loss at home to West Ham. As much as I would love Arsenal to win today, I won't be too bothered by the result as long as we reach next Friday night fit and ready to go and get the three points against Leicester.

Arsene Wenger has almost a full strength squad to choose from with the exceptions of Santi Cazorla, Gabriel Paulista and Francis Coquelin. Alexis Sanchez and Shkodran Mustafi are only just back to pre season training after their international duties this summer and they probably won't be playing from the start. With Alexis's natural fitness and desire to play football every minute of every day I would certainly expect to see him at some stage and it wouldn't even surprise me if he did start.

The summer has been full of rumours and conjecture about his future, but Arsenal have held firm and it really does look like he is going nowhere. It might mean we lose him for nothing next summer which will be a big blow when it comes, but I think it will be worth it when the other options are considered. There's still a chance we will get him to sign a new contract and maybe stick in a clause which will allow him to leave next summer if he chooses I suppose.

As for today the team won't be too different from the one to play Leicester I imagine with the obvious exception of Laurent Koscielny who will be suspended for that game. I imagine we will see both Alexander Lacazette and Sead Kolasinac in the team and we will go with three central defenders too. I have a feeling Nacho Monreal is going to get a lot more game time on the left of that trio with Kolasinac playing the wing back role this season.

Chelsea have splashed a fair bit of cash this summer and Antonio Conte seems determined to put his own stamp on the team despite delivering the league title in his first season in charge last May. They have to be one of the favourites to win it again this season and their chances certainly look a lot better than Arsenal's at the moment. We still need to add at least two more players before the transfer window ends if we're going to have any real chance of competing for the title this season and time is slowly clicking towards the shutting of the transfer window.

I expect we'll see a pretty good game today with both teams almost there in terms of fitness for the new season. I have no doubt Chelsea would like some revenge for us beating them in the cup final and preventing them from doing the double, but our record at Wembley in recent seasons is very good. I'd take the defeat if it happens today without much bother if we can keep that Wembley form for our league game against Spurs later this season. 

I hope to see our new players fitting in well today and the team shaping up nicely for Friday night against Leicester. A win would be nice, but as I said already it counts for little in the scheme of real football and proper trophies. 

That's it for today.

See you tomorrow.

Arsenal Transfers Update

With the new season getting nearer and nearer it finally looks like we could be getting the sort of transfer activity which has been promised since last season ended. So far we have seen the arrivals of both Alexandre Lacazette and Sead Kolasinac with Wojciech Szczesny eventually departing to Juventus. I'm very happy with the arrivals of both Lacazette and Kolasinac, but I can't say I was overly happy to see Szczesny go.

He's done very well in his two years on loan at Roma and I honestly think he is at least an equal to Petr Cech and certainly better than any other options we have besides Cech. Maybe his bridges were burned along with that cigarette in the showers at Southampton, but I can't help feeling we might have made a mistake. Time will tell I suppose and playing understudy to Gianluigi Buffon at Juventus certainly won't make him a worse goalkeeper.


He's the only real departure of any note so far even if it does appear there are plenty more lining up at the exit door. It seems there is no place for Lucas Perez, Carl Jenkinson, Mathieu Debuchy, Jack Wilshere, Calum Chambers, Kieran Gibbs and maybe even a few more before the transfer deadline day. I would have thought David Ospina would be one of those on his way, but the sale of Szczesny has to make that fairly unlikely now.

The future of Alexis Sanchez is still uncertain, but the club seem to be determined to keep him even if it means losing him for nothing this time next year. I hope it doesn't come to that and he can be talked into a new contract, but if he can't I have to agree that it's better to keep him at the club for one final season despite what it might do to the bank balance in a year. He is the best player we have and if we are to make any impression next season we need to keep him and see how he can team up with Lacazette and Mesut Ozil.

There are plenty of rumours of the impending departures of Gibbs, Chambers, Perez and Jenkinson, but it might not be so easy to shift Debuchy or Wilshere. They're all on very good contracts at Arsenal and any team looking to buy them will have to think twice about matching their wages. We could be faced with a few of them not finding clubs because the money just isn't there to pay them.

We need to get their wages off the books though so we can pay that bit extra to the likes of Ozil and maybe Sanchez and the money we get for them would of course go nicely towards any upcoming purchases. The two players most likely to come at the moment seem to be Thomas Lemar and William Carvalho with the team/squad needing strengthening in their positions and both players possibly available. If we could add them to what we have already I think we could be almost optimistic about next season and it's been a while since I felt like that going into a new season with Arsenal.

It's also quite possible that we could lose Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain before the window closes as he doesn't seem eager to sign a new contract with only a year left to run on his current deal. It's a bit like the Alexis situation except Chamberlain isn't quite as valuable to us and we have never really found his true position in the team in his seven years at the club. He's a player who can be so good sometimes and the opposite too often too, but I still think he has a role to play in the long season ahead.

Much has been made of the need to sell Theo Walcott as he doesn't fit into our new formation, but playing with wing backs is hardly set in stone and I think we need to keep him too. He scored 19 goals last season and frustrate us as he might at times it won't be easy to replace those goals. Like Olivier Giroud he still has something to offer and I don't think we should be too quick to offload either of them. I would be surprised if Arsene Wenger thinks differently, but you never know what he might do if the right offer comes in.

With the new season comes a new season of "Fantasy Premier League" and as usual my "Ever Arsenal" league is up and running and there's €50 to the winner from my pocket unless a generous sponsor wants to step in and offer prizes galore. There's been well over a thousand teams in my league for the last few seasons and judging by the early uptake there will be again this season. If you haven't played before you can sign up here and join my league after you have set your team up by using the league code 57957-16522. For those who have been in the league before you will automatically rejoin once you set your team up and you can also find an auto link on my Twitter feed.

I'm also running my Predictions League again this season and you can find the link to join here and join my mini league with the code tq3c5. It's on the Talksport site and anyone good enough to predict all 10 scorelines correctly in a week can win £1,000,000 from them, but taking part in my mini league is obviously a lot more prestigious. I'll be updating the league here every week along with my usual fantasy tips and predictions.

That's it for today.

See you tomorrow.

Arsenal Get Their Man

Transfers are rarely a thing of speed when Arsenal are involved and so it was with Alexandre Lacazette, but the announcement came on Wednesday evening and we welcomed our record purchase to the club. It looks like we finally managed to land the striker we have being missing since Robin van Persie done a bunk five years ago. Despite scoring so many goals last season Arsenal could have done so much more with the right man up front.

As good as Olivier Giroud might be I think Lacazette is a step up from him despite Giroud keeping him out of the French national team. To be fair to Lacazette it's actually Antoine Griezmann who is keeping him out of the French team as Giroud fulfills a different role for his country to the one Lacazette would attempt to fill. As good as Lacazette is I have no doubt we would have been even happier if Griezmann was on his way to us, but we have at least managed to get Lacazette as a result of Griezmann staying put at Atletico Madrid.

The story goes that they had lined Lacazette up to replace Griezmann if he left, but their transfer embargo meant they weren't prepared to let Griezmann go and we got Lacazette. Atletico's record in buying strikers has been pretty good and hopefully their judgement on Lacazette was spot on and Arsenal can reap the benefits. We haven't had a striker capable of netting 30 league goals in a season in five years, but we most certainly have one now.

The fee was somewhere north of the 40 something million we spent on Mesut Ozil and if the rumours are true we haven't finished yet. It looks like we're intent on increasing our attacking options, but it's difficult to know if that will work out with the futures of Ozil and Alexis Sanchez still up in the air. Hopefully the arrival of Lacazette will encourage Alexis to stay even if it's only to see out the final year of his contract.

It would be a huge mistake to sell Alexis to Manchester City, but there doesn't seem to be too many other clubs willing to meet our asking price or pay the wages he's looking to get. The reaction to selling our best player to a rival would be extremely negative and it would get the new season off on a note which could be difficult for the manager and the players to cope with. I know Alexis could go for nothing next summer, but that sounds more acceptable to me right now than selling him to City. I don't want him to go at all, but if it does happen it has to be to a club outside the Premier League.

I would like to see a team with both Alexis and Lacazette in it next season and see how they can combine to terrorise opposition defences. With Ozil behind them to pull the strings it should hopefully be a thing of beauty if it comes to pass. I would like to see Giroud stick around too as he proved to be pretty effective off the bench last season and he offers us a different way to play if things need changing. The arrival of Lacazette could see his exit though as he will be anxious to play as much as possible this season with the World Cup on the horizon.

We have certainly spent an awful lot of money in the last year and it might be time to recoup a little of that by selling some of the players who are surplus to requirements and getting their wages off the books too. The squad and team still need strengthening considering we finished a deserved fifth last season and it's time to invest some of what we have left in more defensive aspects of the team. The arrival of Sead Kolasinac on a free transfer was certainly a boost to our defensive options, but we still looks a little fragile at the back and in midfield to me.

Hopefully we can keep both Hector Bellerin and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, but a reserve right back could be needed as well as possibly another central defender and midfielder. We let in too many goals last season and even though the switch to five at the back improved things we still need to strengthen. I would love to see Wojciech Szczesny come back into the fold too as I think he's our next best option to Petr Cech if not even better than him. He looks like he might have matured a little in two years in Italy and he has certainly played well in that time.

At least we have brought two players who will improve the team in and in plenty of time too with the players just back for pre-season this week. How we fare next season will depend on how much more can be done with the squad between now and our season opener at home to Leicester on Friday August 11th. That's only five weeks from tomorrow and you will be amazed how quickly those five weeks will pass.

That's it for today.

See you tomorrow.