I was doing other things last night, so I only checked in and out on the game, but seeing them drop a 3-0 away to Brentford was hilarious. This was a side that their fans were telling us would rival us for the Premier League because of the lack of midweek football and the amazing squad and attack they have. Yet here we are on match week five, and they’ve lost two, drawn one, and have conceded so many goals that even Shkodran Mustafi would have felt he stood a chance of getting in the team at this rate.

Brentford are a tough nut to crack away from home, I will grant them that, but it’s still funny to see their fans getting angry. If you’ve spent any time on this blog over the years, you’ll know that I find that odious club utterly reprehensible, and an opportunity to be happy at any downfall they have is an absolute pleasure.

But it’s only a ‘half-pleasure’ right now, because we have to do our jobs later for the 3pm kick-off, and Mikel Arteta gave us an update yesterday, which certainly made me feel a little more comfortable about us going into this one at 3pm.

Firstly, the team news, which sounds pretty positive. Ben White was described by the boss as “all good”. He also said he’s “very positive about everybody” and whilst Ben might feel a little hard done by in terms of a lack of England recall for the upcoming barren wasteland that is the next international break, I do like that we have both him and Timber back for this one. It means Arteta can decide to give Jurrien 60 minutes and let Ben finish the game, or flip it the other way around, as they stage-manage Timber’s fitness following his lengthy absence.

Likewise, we have positives on Mosquera and Hincapie, who are all confirmed to be part of yesterday’s training session, which is great to hear. It will even be a difficult match selection to make for the manager, because he can only name a 20-man squad, and I make it so that we have the following players fit:

1. Raya
2. Kepa
3. Mosquera
4. White
5. Hincapie
6. Gabriel
7. Konsa
8. Timber
9. Calafiori
10. Odegaard
11. Eze
12. Merino
13. Zubimendi
14. Bruno
15. RiceLewis-Skelly
16. Dowman
17. Saka
18. Gyokeres
19. Tzolis
20. Madueke
21. Havertz

I haven’t mentioned Salmon there, but you’d assume he’s not going to make the matchday squad. If I’m looking at that list, I’m probably saying Max gets a sit-down having played in midweek, but given his output against Ipswich, it might be tempting for Arteta. If that happens, he’s going to find himself in an uncomfortable chat with a senior pro. I guess that’s the nature of the beast when you have a squad that is aiming to fight for the top honours this season.

So, with that level of competition available today, who should he play for this one?

For me, if he’s fit, I’d certainly get Timber in there. We need our most robust defensive side today, because Brighton play a high press and have created chances all season. We’re only four games in; their stats are skewed a bit by the pulverising they gave Coventry last week, but Brighton have created significantly the most xG this season on 10.18, scoring 13 goals and leading the league so far. Again, some of that is predicated on the fact that they got three of their five goals against a Coventry side that had gone down to 10 men and were already two down by the time Awoniyi was sent off, but they have still shown they can bag goals against Chelsea (three) and Villa (four). SO this Arsenal team will be tested by a VERY confident Brighton side on their own turf. Brighton will be aggressive; they will look to win the ball high up the pitch, they will try to suffocate and strangle us in our own half, so for us those out-balls from defence are vital. We need passes out from the back, and so whilst I am a little bit minded to wonder whether Hincapie is the better option to start for his defensive prowess, it’s the range that Calafiori has that makes me think he will edge it for a starting place.

In midfield, I think we’ll see a change from Sunderland. I think Bruno will come in for Myles, and we’ll see Rice and Odegaard back. Then up top, I think it’ll be the same front three again as was featured in our last Premier League outing, which sets the team up like this:

Raya

Timber – Konsa – Gabriel – Calafiori

Bruno

Odegaard – Rice

Saka – Havertz – Tzolis

And it’s in those left and right wide forward positions that I’m looking at our two attackers and saying, “this is where you lads need to be the game changers today”. Brighton will push their fullbacks high; they will leave men in our half, because Huerzeler has his way of playing, and he will want to impose the Brighton approach to this game. They’ll probably have more possession than us. I suspect they will most likely score, even though some of our defensive stats and xG that we give away is crazy-good right now. But Brighton take a lot of shots, they score a lot of goals, they press high up the pitch, and they dominate the ball (they are averaging 70.9% possession this season already). As I said yesterday, I think this will easily be our toughest game of the season. Getting three points today would be massive.

One final stat that I thought was interesting, as I looked at the numbers for any weaknesses, and it is that Brighton are 15th in the Premier League for xG conceded. This Brighton team will give us chances, given all of their good play and attacking prowess so far this season. And the ‘xG per shot’ stat – which basically tells you the quality of shots they give up – is the worst in the Premier League. So when they do give you chances, it’s probably in the box and with the most likely chance of being a goal so far this season, albeit admittedly with a small sample size. But even though there are only four games to use as data points, some patterns of style of play are already evident, and we know what type of opponent we’re going to be up against, despite their injuries to key players. The one that has impressed me the most is Yalcouye; he looked good in the Chelsea game and bagged a goal in the Coventry win. He’s slotted in really well, and I think he might be a danger man to watch this afternoon.

Arsenal have the tools to win this; we have the form we’ve been showing to hurt Brighton, but football has so many variables that this one is really tough to call. I just hope what somebody said on the blog in the comments yesterday is going to ring true today: They occasionally do throw one in their own net. That would be useful on the South Coast.

Catch you all tomorrow for a debrief. Have a good one, peeps.

It was a cautionary tale of the ‘always on’ mentality needed in the Premier League.

Sunderland were superb at home last season. It is the reason they are playing in Europe in midweek next week. They drew with us, Villa, United and City, and they beat The Scum (although that was less of a ‘feat’ last season), and they showed that with the right coaching, shape and structure, a newly promoted team can easily avoid relegation if they have the right signings in place as well. Granit Xhaka was a key one in that respect, and tonight we’ll face up against him for the second time, having missed him at the Emirates last season. He is a fighter; we all know that, and the vision of him standing over Merino and having a go at him still sticks in my mind. He will be all smiles and hugs before the game, but the second that he crosses that white line, he will view us as the enemy, and those Arsenal players will need to treat him as such as well.

I don’t think it will be that hard, though; there aren’t actually many players left from the last time Xhaka played for The Arsenal. That day was a 5-0 win in which he got two goals, but the squad that day only now has White, Ødegaard and Saka in it; such has been the renewal of Arteta’s Arsenal since the Swiss left. There will still be smiles and a happy reunion with the manager, and I enjoyed his interview with the Premier League ahead of this one. His is a story with a great redemption arc, and as fans we love to see that kind of stuff.

So then, to the football, and what sort of game we’re going to get from Sunderland today. With only three Premier League data points to draw upon, and all against what you would call ‘mid-table’ opposition or worse, it is difficult to say with any certainty how Regis Le Bris will line his side up. I saw an interesting stat today from Opta that since the start of last season, Sunderland have played the most forward passes in the whole league. They are a direct side, who want to go forward quickly, and the ‘zones of control’ on this page show that they are more left-sided dominant than anywhere else. On that side they have Nelson Angulo, but they also have the new guy Fofana, who was rumoured to be with us on deadline day, so I wonder if those two might share minutes today, as Le Bris tries to keep his side fresh for Alkmaar in midweek next week.

Opta has them lining up in a 4-2-3-1, and I think most of the pundits are suggesting that, but I suspect it will be a similar approach to last season. That means I think they’ll look to go a little longer, but in our defensive third, it’ll be Enzo Le Fee and Brobbey who will be looking to win those battles. Brobbey showed at the Emirates that he’s a big, strong, powerful guy, so perhaps aerial duels might be something that Gabriel and Konsa need to be mindful of.

In terms of the data, it’s tough because, as mentioned already, the sample size is small, but from what we have seen so far, Sunderland are down there in terms of goals scored (three), their xG is around mid-table (4.40), they’re about mid-table on the total number of shots and shots on target, possession, passing numbers, the lot. They sit towards the top of the league on through balls, which rings true with their forward passing metrics that I saw from Opta; if they’re getting on the ball in the middle third, they’re going to try to put Brobbey in.

Defensively, they are up there with us in terms of xG conceded, sort of, because we’re miles in front of anyone in terms of how miserly we are in front of goal. But they’ve shown that they have a decent shape about them so far, so we will need to be better in front of goal than we were against Napoli, I reckon. I suspect we won’t get as many clear-cut chances as we did in Naples on Wednesday.

So how do we beat them?

Well, for me, a lot of what is good about us so far is via Martin Odegaard, so he surely feels like the guy we need to get on the ball. It’s funny because when you look at our stats on Opta, we are dominant on both left and right sides of the pitch. I looked at that map on that page and assumed it would show us right-side bias, but we’ve been mixing it up with Tzolis in there, as last weekend against Chelsea, where our second goal came from, attests. If Sunderland are left-side biased, and we are right-side biased, it does feel like whoever wins that battle will be the eventual victors.

So in terms of team set-up, I suspect Arteta goes back to the side that succeeded against Chelsea:

Raya

White – Konsa – Gabriel – Calafiori

MLS

Odegaard – Rice

Saka – Havertz – Tzolis

Maybe he has a think about Bruno for Myles, which is certainly something I’d be thinking about, given how he’ll get a hostile reception, and it’s the type of game I suspect he thrives on. But I just have a feeling that Arteta puts his faith in Myles once more, with rotation happening in the second half. That team has shown it can get goals, and with the slightly rotated side in midweek not exactly putting a decent-but-not-great Napoli side to the sword, I think Arteta reverts to what I think we’d all call the ‘first XI’ based on form and availability right now.

I often find myself saying “start early” in these preview blogs, but I don’t think we have to today. We can feel our way into the game. If we can limit Sunderland’s opportunities in attack, it’ll keep the home fans quiet, which will be absolutely fine by me, you and any Arsenal fan tuning in or in the stadium. But we need to be ready for direct football and a Sunderland side who will fancy a scalp under the lights.

Right, I’m off to go and see a bunch of old Spitfires perform at Duxford, so I’ll bid you all a fine farewell. Let’s hope Everton can make this a hilarious afternoon at The Scum Stadium, before we kick off in the North East. Ciao.

Let’s get it straight – Chelsea have been a basket case, and last season they were a bit of a joke. How they got to any cup final is a minor miracle, but they have looked a rag-tag bunch of assorted footballers accumulated because Clearlake watched Moneyball too many times and thought it was easy.

This season may be in its infancy, but already they have shown what they are going to be all about: Blistering attack. They have a litany of creative players, and in Rogers, Palmer and Joao Pedro they have a rapid forward line who feel like they are set up for swift counterattacks when out of possession. Which you have to think is the way they’ll play today. Whether Alonso wants to play that kind of football long-term remains to be seen, but in many ways the first two games of the season have probably provided him with a decent enough blueprint for how to line up against us today, i.e. hit Arsenal in transition when the ball turns over and get the ball forward as quickly as possible. Emi Martinez basically went full-Jordan Pickford on his debut and went long time and time again, and it’s hard not to see him do that again today. Playing out from the back, with their defensive challenges, against an Arsenal team who wants to win the ball high up the pitch, would be suicide. So I think Chelsea are going long, and they’ll want to contest duels over the halfway line up against our defence.

That’s where I start to look at who might be the best pairing for Gabriel: Konsa or Mosquera?

Initially, I would have thought it would be Konsa, but having looked at his numbers from last season, he’s in the 59th percentile for aerial duels won, which isn’t exactly amazing. Where he excels is in ground duels, in which he’s one of the best in the Premier League, but in the air, less so, according to those numbers in the link. Gabriel, when I look at it, ranks at around the 20th best in the Premier League (which includes attackers too), so I wonder if we will almost certainly see the same approach to what Brighton faced last weekend.

So Chelsea will let us have the ball; they will want to hit rapid back-to-front counters; they will go long out from their ‘keeper. How do we win this game then?

It sounds a little redundant, but the first goal matters here more than usual, I think. If Chelsea score early, I do worry about our need to get back into it and leaving space in places we don’t want to leave space. Those pockets out wide when our fullbacks have pressed up higher in the pitch; think of the goal City scored early at the Emirates last season when Calafiori got drawn out. That’s what I worry about. And then, just like that day, Chelsea tucking in and trying to make it difficult for us by compacting into a lower block, leaving one or two rapid players up top so that we have something to worry about on the counter.

We have to be prepared for this. I think Arteta will certainly have been thinking long and hard about this, as well as those game state scenarios in which we are behind and how we respond.

Team news-wise, Alonso said he wasn’t sure about Caicedo, but I think he will be playing today. They have Leeds in midweek, then they play Hull – both at home – and if he can push Caicedo to get 60 – 70 minutes today, those are games he could probably leave him out to rest for. And if he plays, then it’s a player who can cover a lot of defensive ground, which enables their attackers to effectively be given a little less restriction on sitting deep in a defensive shape. That worries me. If Caicedo doesn’t play, I think I’m feeling a little more confident about this one, for sure.

For us, I do think Arteta starts Konsa, particularly given we’re expected to have the ball and he has a very good passing range. I also think that Bruno might start too, because of his cameo and forward passing range he’s already shown in coming on against Villa. He was impressive; he can sit in that six role, be up for that battle when Chelsea go long, but he’ll also look to set Arsenal players in behind against a Chelsea back line that has looked a little shaky at times already this season. However, as mentioned, game state has played a big part in this, and I don’t see Chelsea being as open against us as they were against Fulham and Brighton. In those two games, they were the big dog; they were the ones that were expected to go forward more; they were the team that would perhaps have switched off and left a bit more space because they know that they can hit those teams hard when the ball turns over. They don’t know that as much against us, so I wonder if they will actually be much tighter and more compact against an Arsenal side that they know is drilled to within an inch of its life about shape.

The rest of the team selection I think is faily self explanatory, so I’m opting for:

Raya

White – Konsa – Gabriel – Calafiori

Bruno

Odegaard – Rice

Saka – Havertz – Eze

Actually, maybe Eze needs a little more of an explanation. I think these kinds of games need some kind of end product magic to them, which Eze has, and if Chelsea do move into a deeper block without possession, he might find himself in pockets where his close control and long-range finishing might be useful for us. Havertz clearly starts against his old club, and has got a couple of goals against them, so let’s hope for some more.

At this early stage of the season, nothing is really terminal; it’s just about bragging rights and statements. Which is why I am thinking that actually I think this one might play out like the City game last season, and end with the points shared. Earlier in the week on the Same Old Arsenal pod, I predicted an Arsenal 2-1 win, but the more I’ve thought about this, the more I think that this kind of game feels ripe for one of those “Sky Sports builds up, ends up a cagey 1-1 draw”. So I’m changing my mind. I hope I’m wrong.

I’m there for my first game of the season today, so I’m hoping for a good one, and all three points. Back tomorrow for a post-match debrief. See you then.

I watched bits of the Chelsea game and, whilst going forward they did look good to be fair, cutting Brighton open on several occasions, at the back they look shaky as heck, and if they are like that against us next weekend, I’d 100% back us to pick up the points. But there’s no doubt they have a wee bit of momentum after those wins, so The Arsenal need to build theirs this evening with a team that has been a bit of a thorn in our side in recent years. In the last four games, we’ve won two and lost two. If you use the COVID period as a line in the sand, it’s four wins for Villa versus three for us, and the defeat last season was in incredibly late and dramatic fashion.

For some reason, a bit like Newcastle fans, Villa seem to have an irrational hatred for us. Perhaps it is because we continue to insist that Unai Emery is not that great, whereas they point to his trophy haul in his career, having delivered the Europa League to Villa once again. But in tonight’s game, we see a Villa side who have had the bulk of their stars taken away from them. Morgan Rogers, Ollie Watkins, Ezri Konsa, Youri Tielemans, Donyell Malen, Emi Martinez, Lucas Digne, with Douglas Luiz and Jadon Sancho also returning from whence they came upon the expiry of their contracts. In return, we will find ourselves up against plenty of familiar names (as I went through yesterday), but not in a Villa shirt. And it is my hope that our consistency of team can therefore have the edge over the uncertainty of the Villa side, who are still working out their own automatisms. I will begrudgingly admit that Emery has done a good job with Villa; they finished in the Champions League places last season, they massively outperformed metrics like xG, and they have plenty of talent who can hurt us (Cash and Buendia both got the goals for them against us last season). The stats that day told of a fairly even game, with both teams sharing a roughly equal amount of possession, shots on and off target, fouls, corners, etc. But it was an Arsenal team who were makeshift at the back, with Gabriel and Saliba both out that day.

Tonight, we know that Saliba won’t play, so for me it’s time to give Konsa his debut. He’s a big boy, he’ll be well aware of the pantomime booing that will come his way. He’ll know that it is just part of the spectacle, but he’s a professional who was bought because of his experience and abilities, and so I say we have to chuck him in alongside Big Gabi. It’s harsh on Mosquera, who I thought did well against Coventry, but you don’t spend £50million on an experienced England international to see him not play in big games. And this is a big game. So for me I’d have the following as my line up this evening:

Raya

White – Konsa – Gabriel – Calafiori

MLS

Odegaard – Rice

Saka – Havertz – Tzolis

With Gabriel Martinelli due to be confirmed as departed the club any time soon, Tzolis is basically the defacto number one choice at left wing, but I wouldn’t be averse to seeing Eze there more too. I’ve also chosen Calafiori as the one I’d want in there because he has started the season really well, he seems to already be striking up a good rapport with Tzolis, taking up positions that enable them to find each other with regularity, so whilst we all love Hincapié, that feels like the right thing to do to kick off this game.

And the good news for Arteta is that he has so many options. Mosquera is a great cover for White or Konsa, Hincapie covers both Calafiori or Gabriel, whilst Zubimendi is an World Cup winner that could equally start instead of MLS. We don’t have 100% certainty over Bruno, but there’s no need to rush him back when you also have Eze and Merino available, whilst up top Viktor Gyokeres can be used in the second half if Kai isn’t working. And if Saka is to be protected, then Madueke is there too. We have such depth and I expect Arteta will certainly want to use it at some stage this evening.

Villa will look to press high and be compact in that midfield area of the pitch; Unai likes to leave a little more space with a higher line, so weirdly, if that happens, it’d be the kind of game that Big Vik might thrive on. But with Kai having scored two in two if you count the Community Shield, you can’t be dropping him. Maybe there are options in the second half, but the way the initial skirmishes go in this game, I’d expect Villa to try to go from back-to-front as quickly as possible as soon as there is a transition, looking to spring traps on us as we build up as we usually do through the likes of Odegaard. So we’ll need to be ready for that and I do think that’s why you have to start Konsa, because I think I read a stat/heard a stat that he was one of the most difficult people to get past last season – he’s a duel winner and therefore good with one-on-ones. If you’re coming up against a team who want to spring transitional traps, then you need individuals to win their battles. If he is that guy, if he does it in an Arsenal shirt, he’ll be a fan favourite. But he’ll also be very valuable in games like this.

It’s a game we lost last season, yet still won the league, so you can’t say that a defeat or a draw tonight is a massive problem for this Arsenal side, but given that last season we lost five games, the season before Liverpool lost four and the season before that Man City lost just three, it shows you that the Premier League is usually not won if you pick up a couple of defeats so early in the season. So tonight is one that we need to win and lay down a marker for the rest of the league. Last weekend’s 3-0 win was fun, but it was against a Coventry side who have already shown that they will struggle this season. So we need to be showing against a quality opponent that we are favourites for a reason.

I’ll be back tomorrow for a match review, maybe a word or two about those exiting players (Gabby’s Jesus and Martinelli), but for now, enjoy your bank holiday Monday (if you have one) and I’ll catch you all then.

The Champions – that’s us, by the way – kick off the Premier League season tonight with a home game against newly promoted Coventry City, and whilst I am looking forward to it, I’m also gutted that I booked a holiday to Portugal, where my plane leaves at 4pm this afternoon. Thankfully, I will get to watch the match, as we’ll be touching down by 7pm, but I’m still going to miss the atmosphere, the noise, the euphoria, as well as seeing the Premier League trophy being proudly displayed. The ground is going to be rocking, because for many, it will be the first time we’ve seen the trophy in our own stadium, given that the title lift was actually at Selhurst Park, which was something we talked about on yesterday evening’s pre-match Same Old Arsenal preview show.

All of that, of course, pales into insignificance in comparison to what goes on on the pitch this evening. It goes without saying that tonight’s game is an absolute ‘must-win ‘. If Arsenal want to win this Premier League title for the second time in a row, for the first time back-to-back since the 1930s, these are the types of games you simply have to win. And whilst we’d all love to get an absolute hammering under our belts this evening, with players still feeling their way into the domestic season, any kind of win would be fine.

We saw last season that grinding out games was just the way we were built; that Wolves home match stands out as one in which we played a pretty terrible team at home, but really made quite a meal of what should have been low-hanging fruit, so we can’t take anyone for granted. And in Coventry City, we have a bit of an unknown quantity; they’ve come up as Champions of the Championship under Frank Lampard, they scored the most goals, they conceded the fewest, they were easy victors, and they did it with a playing style that was aggressive and vertical, rather than being possession-obsessed. Which I think makes for an interesting side note for this game, because the question is whether Lampard is going to stick to those principles of pressing higher, having fullbacks higher up the pitch, getting players close to his striker, and trying to have a go at us today? Or is he going to be more pragmatic, realise that you can’t out-gun the Gunners on home turf, and therefore revert to what we see a lot of at the Emirates: The dreaded low block?

Obviously, from our perspective, we hope he comes and has a go. We hope that because it’s the first game of the season. They have nothing to lose, because they know that they have a whole season to make it up if they get beat today; he pushes forward and leaves more space. If that happens, then you’d hope that we have enough quality to see off Coventry under the lights on our own turf.

The question we all have is what the starting XI will look like. Mikel had his pre-match press conference yesterday and the only real question mark around this appears to be Bruno G, who Mikel said “Let’s see how he is. He’s evolving really well, but let’s see for tomorrow”, but some rumours were circulating last night that he’d picked up a hamstring injury in the Community Shield. It would be the absolute most Arsenal thing ever that our new signing has picked up a knock, though; Welcome to The Arsenal…here’s the medical department…

James suggested last night on the pod that he thought he’d be fine, and if he is, then there are some real questions over who starts in that midfield, because we are absolutely stocked with players, and there’s gonna be some unhappy campers in that team tonight, because some aren’t even making the bench. If I had to guess, though, with the Community Shield still fresh in Mikel’s mind, I wonder if he’ll go with the same XI from that game? Myles at the base, Bruno left, Martin right, perhaps? We’ve all talked about ‘easing’ Rice back in, and this feels like the type of game where you could do that. Alternatively, if you think we’re going to get chances against Coventry (which you’d hope we would), then why not try Eze and Odegaard in the two eights, with Myles anchoring the midfield?

Alternatively, you could even give Zubi the nod, after Mikel publicly said yesterday that he’s an important part of his plans. He also said the same for Myles, though, too, so either starting is a-ok with me.

So, let’s pick a lineup then, shall we? For last season, it felt impossible at times; such was the plethora of options Mikel had across his whole squad. It feels even more difficult today, but I’ll give it a go not based on who I think Mikel might go with, but rather who I would like to see. So for me, I think a fun team to line up against Coventry could be:

Raya

White – Mosquera – Gabriel – Calafiori

MLS

Odegaard – Eze

Saka – Havertz – Tzolis

I’d be interested to see if Martinelli makes the team squad for the night. If not, you’d have to think something is going on there, because with eight subs allowed plus a ‘keeper, you’re probably going with Hincapié, then Zubimendi and Rice (who I’ve only left out because of the ‘easing’ that I mentioned), you need Gyokeres as your striker, Madueke will most certainly be there, then you’d think Merino for end product. Max Dowman has been in the squad, which is six, then you have probably another defender, which would be Marli Salmon I’d expect. So there’s a spot for Martinelli, but not for Ethan. If both are supposedly being touted out, then maybe neither makes the squad? So it’ll be interesting to see the subs bench more than anything else.

Whatever side he picks, they will – and should – be heavy favourites to win this. The pundits think so. Sutton’s going for a 3-0, the BBC AI has gone for 3-0, their guest has gone for a 3-0, Lewis Jones on Sky Sports is going for a 3-0, and Sports Mole goes for 2-0. I said 3-0 last night the pod, so I think there’s a universal acceptance that we’re favourites for a reason. But I go back to the first game of the 1995/96 season after we’d signed Dennis Bergkamp, thinking we’d absolutely smash newly promoted Villa and he’d have a field day, but it ended up 1-1. So you never can tell!

Anyway, I’ll leave it there for today. I have some packing to do!

Catch you all tomorrow for a review blog.

But as the countdown begins, as I start to see more and more tactical preview shows, I guess it is time to put those game faces on and start to look at what lies ahead of us on Saturday evening.

It’s a scary prospect. I mean, sure, they play in a Mickey Mouse league that they’ve just won by six points and have been coasting for the last few weeks, enabling them to focus on the Champions League prep, but they are still a thoroughly impressive side. And we will – by the sounds of every European football expert out there – find ourselves as underdogs on Saturday. They have spent the season resting players at the right moment; they have the balance and blend to their season that enables them to do that, plus they have some of the most frightening attackers on the planet. In the knockout stages, they smashed Chelsea 8-2 on aggregate. They did Liverpool 4-0 on aggregate over two legs. Then there was that crazy 5-4 game against Bayern, which they followed up with a 1-1 draw at the Allianz. So they know where the net is.

But they also aren’t the tightest at the back either. In the Champions League this season, they have scored a whopping 44 goals across their 16 matches, nearly three per match. But they’ve conceded 20 – so they don’t always keep a clean sheet and they are going to leave space for us this coming weekend. We all know Arsenal’s impressive Champions League run, built on the foundations of a solid back line that has conceded just six compared to PSG’s 22, but have also ‘only’ bagged 29 from PSG’s 44. It’s also worth pointing out that we have played two games less, so perhaps that goal tally might be closer to them if we had.

What’s interesting, when you look at the numbers side-by-side, is that PSG averages a higher possession than us, which is not so surprising, but also more ball recoveries and tackles won. Because of the fact that they’ve played two games more, I looked at the ‘average per match’ on the UEFA website, and PSG averages 6.44 tackles per match compared to our 4.43. ON ball recoveries, they average 39.07, compared to our 34.86. The ‘saves’ are more similar – PSG have 2.82 to our 2.43.

So what does this tell me, the very poor data nerd in disguise? Initially, I looked at those numbers and just said out loud, “Well, they’re just better at us at most things, right?” Of course, that could be true, but it could also mean that they make more tackles per game because they put themselves in more compromising positions defensively. Teams towards the bottom of the Premier League often lead the way in things like tackles or blocked shots, because they have to do more of it by volume. Perhaps the same could be said for PSG? Or, perhaps I’m just injecting a little too much Hopium at a time in which we all might need a fair dose of it?

The number of ball recoveries, as I interpret it, could be due to a higher press from PSG. I do think they do press higher than us, and when you can force that from your opponent higher up the pitch, you get more turnovers. In the Champions League this season, we’ve tended to dominate games on possession, often just shutting down matches, so when you slow down the game, then perhaps there is a tendency to see fewer ball recoveries. I think.

There’s one more stat that I saw that I thought might be worth highlighting, which is a goalkeeping stat on the number of claims that Raya for Arsenal, or Chevalier for PSG, makes. In fewer games, Raya has made 38 claims and 19 high claims, whereas Chevalier has 18 claims and 11 high claims. Our goalie commands his box more than the PSG one – could this be an opportunity for us? Given our penchant for set pieces, I certainly hope so.

So there are a few titbits of opportunity for us, but the key will be to stop their constantly rotating and fluid front set of players. The news on Hakimi will be key, because like Calafiori (who I would play in the final, by the way), the Moroccan likes to roam and pop up in unusual places. If he isn’t available (and he’s been out since they played Bayern a month ago), then that’s a big plus for us. They also have Chevalier and Nuno Mendes, who haven’t played since then, but it wouldn’t surprise me if all of those players have basically just been given a month off to prep for this one.

So there is still a bit of team news and expected tactical set up to be concluded ahead of this one, whereas for us it is pretty much just Jurrien Timber who is the question mark. There’s no way he starts on saturday, but getting 20 minutes from him could be big, so let’s just hope for more positive updates. Apparently he was in training yesterday, so that’s great news.

Other than that, we play the waiting game as the build up to this intensifies. It was weird that Arteta did the Champions League presser last week, but I guess there will be more embargoed words that will come out from that one today or tomorrow, as the team make their way to Budapest for the last match of the season.

Right, that’s it from me for today. It’s going to be another scorcher for the UK, so I’m going to finish up here and make sure I have my set up all sorted for a day of work – outside in my garden.

Catch you all tomorrow. Have a great day.

Just two wins.

Sounds simple, right?

Well, yes, the logic of it is. Arsenal start the first half of this two-part challenge tonight against Burnley, a side already relegated and without a full-time manager, who by all rights should be on the beach or at least feeling a little down about the fact they will not be in the Premier League next season. This is a Burnley side with four wins all season, nine draws and 23 defeats to their name. Only Wolves have lost more games. They have conceded 73 goals in their 36 games – an average of just over two goals every match, and have scored just over one per match with their 37.

Burnley have also allowed the most shots of any team in the league – 607 – as well as the most shots on target with 209. On a game average perspective, they have conceded nearly 17 shots in total (16.9) for every match this season, with the opposition also getting nearly six on target (5.8). To give some context, West Ham (sadly all but relegated now after their defeat to Newcastle yesterday) has given up 538 shots and 185 on target. So Burnley have had 69 more shots on their goal than any other side in the Premier League this season.

And yet…

We know that this is The Arsenal, and we never make it easy for ourselves, do we?

If there’s a way to make this difficult, Arsenal, of all teams feel like they could do that, although today I’m hoping that even the smallest fear any Arsenal fan has is extinguished early on. Get that first goal of the match in 15 minutes, and everything changes. Go in at halftime at 0-0, and the stadium might feel a little different than it will tonight before kick off.

I think the Arsenal fans at the ground will be big-time up for this one. The Atletico Madrid blueprint showed us just how much of an impact we can make, and, with it once again being an evening under the lights, with the team bus being greeted at 5.45 pm just like that game, this is set to be another fervent atmosphere that the players need to feed off. The noises coming out from the back channels of people with access to players on social media were that the staff and players were genuinely stunned by the pre-Atletico Madrid build-up. In a really good way. It helped to inspire them, and I think the same will happen tonight. I certainly hope it does. Red Action have done another great job in organising the pre-meet at 5.45 pm by The Bear roundabout in front of the Armoury, so the fans will do their early bit to lift the players in those opening salvoes, but then it needs to be the players that step out onto the pitch to carry those vibes and channel them into their boots.

There has to be a fast start. And for me, that means:

Raya

Mosquera – Saliba – Gabriel – Calafiori

Rice

Odegaard – Eze

Saka – Havertz – Trossard

I debated a bit about Gyokeres, and I’d be more than happy to see that too, but I just worry a little bit about a possible low block. Gyokeres is a tidy finisher, but this season in tight spaces, I just haven’t seen as much as I’d like when in those small spaces, and so for me, I think Havertz just edges it. But this isn’t to say that I’m going to be shouting on the internet if Big Vik plays. His 2026 record and goals scored are there for all to see, and if we’re going to be getting plenty of shots in this game, there are worse people to be having those shots. The challenge for him has been getting the space in these tight games, whereas Kai certainly is better at finding that space and is better with the ball at his feet.

The talk has been about who plays right-back, and it was lovely to see pictures of Timber as he arrived for training, but I can’t see him starting tonight. It surely has to be Mosquera. If we’re going to give Calafiori licence to drift forward more and find pockets of space, then having that guy who can operate as a third centre half feels like it could work well. Imagine Calafiori bombing forward, Gabriel shifting across to cover the space, Saliba shifting centrally, then Mosquera occupying a hybrid right-back/right-centre-half position. Just feels like it works, right?

In the middle of the park, I’ve gone with Rice as the lone six mainly because I want to find a way to get both Eze and Odegaard on the pitch. Martin to try to pick the moments in which it is tight and congested at the back, with Eze the ‘shoot on sight’ player – feels like, given the above context of Burnley, that has the right dynamics on it. It’s slightly harsh on MLS, but when we come to Palace next weekend, I would be thinking more about that game for him than today. Today demands specific skill sets, and I just think the captain and Ebs fit the bill better. The two guys on either side of the forward kind of pick themselves right now. It means that for me, this side has seven of your outfield players who are all quite attack-minded (I count Calafiori in that), which is absolutely what we need.

Burnley will get chances. The fact they have 37 goals this season shows that. But we just need to have 100% concentration at the back and be ruthless in attack.

Fast start. That is everything. Start with the intensity of a side laser-focused on a Premier League title. Game faces on, from the first kick, be at the Burnley players, make it happen. The time for talking is done. Now it is time to deliver.

I’ll be there, a nervous wreck, sure to be singing my heart out and losing my voice by full time. Let’s hope when that final whistle comes, we’re celebrating another victory and just one more cup final to go.

Catch you all tomorrow.

I read comments like “Fulham have never won at The Emirates,” and that only makes it worse. Because you just know there is a first time for everything. And unlike our situation at City, in which we basically NEVER win up there, today could very easily end up with Arsenal dropping points and opening the door to City having a clear path to the Premier League title.

Arsenal, Arteta, and all of those Arsenal players simply MUST be ready for today. Fulham have had a week off, we have been in Madrid on Wednesday, then have a huge game on Tuesday night, but if one single eye is on that midweek match-up against Atleti, you worry that it will be enough for Fulham to get something from today.

They are not in what I call “Charlton territory,” unfortunately. Back in the 90s, I think there were about four or five seasons in which Charlton, under Alan Curbishley, would get to a set number of points, then the foot would come off the gas, and they’d coast their way to the end of the season, losing pretty much most of the games they played. That is not the case this season for a side that sits in 10th with four games to go. The concertina’d nature of this division means that Fulham very much have everything to play for and, having beaten Villa last weekend to give them a sniff of Europe, they have a little bit of confidence going into this game. They will be up for it. They will be looking for a scalp.

And as I talked about yesterday in the blog, Marco Silva will be looking to use every tactical and emotional advantage he can get his hands on. He’s said as much in his pre-match preview, alluding to the potential worry of the home crowd and how he will be hoping they can draw on that tonight. I think that means his approach today is about keeping things tight for the first 45. He’s done this in other games, but Silva is not against a tight back five with his central midfielders tucking in to a lower block, then relying on diagonal directness to spring forward. His ‘utopia’ football game today is Arsenal dominating possession and territory, which creates space as we look to penetrate a stubborn back line, for his players to spring traps when the ball turns over.

My hope is that Arteta has an idea for that. My hope is also that this idea finally involves dropping the Madueke-Gyokeres-Martinelli approach. Don’t do it, Mikel. You need technical security on the ball in attack. This ain’t gonna be no ‘green grass and space’ game. This will be tight, cagey, and will require ballers who work in small spaces.

So for me, my ‘hoping for’ lineup is:

Raya

White   –   Saliba   –   Gabriel   –   Calafiori

Rice

Odegaard   –   Eze

Saka   –   Gyokeres   –   Trossard

That team has an attacking line-up of players who are all good with the ball at their feet. They are not runners in behind; they are more suited to quick interplay. I’ve gone with Ben White, despite the fact he played in midweek, because I look at that right-hand side with Saka back in (I think given he’s now been in training over a week, played a part against Newcastle, as well as Atletico Madrid, he should be able to do a solid 60 minutes) and I am hoping for a “We’re getting the band back together” automatism or two between White, Saka and Odegaard. White overlaps to create space for Bukayo, with Martin gravitating towards him.

I’ve suggested Rice as the six because he was really good there in midweek, so why not lean in to it more, whilst allowing Eze to float into those left-hand spaces, where Trossard and Gyokeres overlap? You have yourself a right-hand side ‘pod’ that is familiar, but how about stocking a left-hand side one too?

And then, for good measure, get Calafiori in there to cause a little bit of chaos in those pockets on the left-hand side? Yes, please, ma’am.

I also think that lineup helps Gyokeres. He can’t trap the ball. He won’t be able to run in behind of a deep-lying defence. But if he’s got players who have the eye for a pass and the ability to thread the needle with their distribution, maybe he can find pockets to get some shots off. The alternative would be Gabriel Jesus, which would be interesting, but we just don’t get enough from him these days for me to think he’s anything other than a 20-minute cameo player.

Do I think Arteta will go for that? Possibly not really. You could potentially see Mosquera instead of White, as Arteta looks to split the minutes between some of his fatigued players, plus he’s played Zubimendi basically every time he’s fit. So my gut tells me that he’s going to play the Spaniard once more. I also wonder whether Trossard is on the naughty step and Eze might play again on the left-hand side. I think it’s more likely that Eze starts and Odegaard is rested, given he started in midweek and Arteta will want to be careful with his captain’s minutes. So the likelihood of me getting my wish today is probably slim.

But it would make for an exciting opportunity to see if we can recapture some more technical control, ball dominance and chance creation, plus trying something a little different, wouldn’t it? And given some of the performances we’ve had at home, maybe leaning into something different could just be the ‘unlock’ that sees Arsenal ‘click’ at the perfect moment in the season.

G’wan Mikel, give it a go. I dares ya.

Let’s see. I’m in Portugal today visiting the parental units, so it’ll be a watching brief from the sofa for me this evening. I just hope I’m smiling by the end of today.

Back tomorrow with a blog and pod first thing. Let’s hope it’s a happy one.

Until then.

The Premier League games just hit differently.

That’s why the nerves are already starting to ramp up.

Bournemouth is a good side. They are a well-coached side. On Saturday, they will be a well-rested side, too, and in the time since they last played on 20th March at home to Man United, we’ve played:

• Three Champions League games
• One League Cup final
• One FA Cup quarter-final

There are a lot more minutes in those Arsenal players’ legs than there are in those of the Bournemouth players.

They have a pretty strong and relatively injury-free injury squad to call from, too. We’ll hear more from Iraola tomorrow, but by my count, they might only be missing Justin Kluivert, Julio Soler, and perhaps Tyler Adams. They also have the benefit of UAE-favouring Michael Oliver and Darren England. Honestly, I don’t understand why at this stage in the season, they don’t just stick him in random mid-table games, because any contentious decision against us this weekend is just going to have more people questioning the man’s integrity. For what it’s worth, I don’t think he is corrupt, but I do think he has an unconscious bias against Arsenal in certain games. Namely, those against Man City, and if he’s the ref next weekend, I’ll probably be blowing my lid more than this weekend. He’s refereed us twice this season; one was the 0-0 draw in which he and his VAR officials decided that Olana’s blatant handball wasn’t a handball (which I put on VAR more than Oliver), as well as the 4-1 home win against the Scum. So this season has not been as bad as we might have worried. Indeed, Bournemouth fans feel the same about him, but their story is similar. I haven’t watched the games in question, but they have a 2-0 win away at Wolves, a 0-0 at home to Chelsea, and a 2-2 away at Leeds.

I got this sense from them whilst having a look at one of their fan forums – Up The Cherries – and they’re feeling like this, be more history repeating itself as the draw specialists. They have 15 in the League so far, which is almost half of their games, and the only club that comes close to that are Sunderland and Brighton, on 10 draws this season. Those 15 draws have stopped a promising start to the season from being a run like Forest had last season to try to get Champions League football, and I seem to recall Bournemouth being up in the top spots after eight games. Their current position of 13th isn’t where they’d want to be, but the very nature of this league this season means that it’s congested enough that a few wins could put them in contention for European spots. With the coefficient confirmed after our win on Tuesday, I think it means if you’re down in eighth, you could make it. If Chelsea or City win the FA Cup, I think it confirms a Europa League spot in the Premier League. Bournemouth are currently just four points off that position (currently occupied by Everton), so for sure they have something to play for this weekend.

Their fans are naturally feeling that we will be nervous, and there is an opportunity to smell blood. I can understand that; last season they picked up wins both home and away, whilst in the game at the beginning of January they went ahead through a Gabriel mistake really early, before going ahead to cruise 3-1, before Kroupi pulled out a wonder strike to make the game a little nervous at the end. In those last three games, there is enough there to make Bournemouth fans feel optimistic, because before then, we had a fabulous record against them – winning each of the previous five games, and winning eight of the previous nine going back to 2018. But Iraola has changed their fortunes somewhat, with two wins and three defeats since he joined. So we need to be ready for a really tough game.

From a statistical point of view, Bournemouth are a side who score goals and concede goals with a fairly even level of regularity – I guess, hence the draws they pick up! They are the sixth-highest goal scorers in the league, whilst also conceding the fifth-highest number of goals. They take a lot of shots (and get plenty on target), they create high levels of xG (again, sixth in the league), and they try to get in as many crosses as possible. They press the ball high; they’re only behind Brighton, City and Everton in the league, just ahead of us, and their attacks are direct – they have had more direct attacks than any other team in the league this season so far (just behind us).

So we’re starting to have the data give us a bit of intel about what we might come up against on Saturday:

• Higher press
• Plenty of shots
• Go direct, but try to get wide to get crosses in

If they play like they have done all season, they will create chances, but they will also give us space too. That rings true if you think about the game at their ground, when they managed to unsettle us on two occasions. I’ve had a look back on the stats from that day and Bournemouth had 15 shot attempts, with three on target, whilst we had 12 and five on target. They played a 4-2-3-1 and at least two players from that day won’t be playing – Semenyo and Kluivert. They’ve replaced Semenyo with the Brazilian Rayan, who is quick, likes to beat a man and in a game that might end up being end-to-end, he could be one that we need Calafiori to be concerned with.

I’ll do a little more on Bournemouth tomorrow, as we await team news, but for today I will leave you with this thought: I think we might get a good game on Saturday. It might be terrifying, but I don’t think we’re getting Low Block FC rocking up at The Emirates.

This is our first one since Mikel Arteta took us to Wembley for the FA Cup, albeit behind closed doors, and it’s the first time we’ve been at Wembley since we played in the Community Shield back in 2023. That day, we saw Kai Havertz and Jurrien Timber for the first time, as we beat City on penalties 4-1. Whilst I absolutely don’t want to see that type of fixture play out today, if you offered it to me right now, I would take it.

That’s because we all know rumours of Man City’s demise have been greatly overestimated. This is a Pep Guardiola side who, if they win their game in hand and beat us on their own patch (we haven’t won at the Etihad in over 11 years in the Premier League), will only be three behind us in the league, a side who still boasts elite talent like Haaland, Doku, Semenyo, Rodri et al, a side who might have stumbled lately, have still won 31 of the 48 matches they’ve played this season.

Arsenal must be ready for what is going to be an incredibly hard challenge.

But I believe in this Arsenal team. I am nervous – of course I am – but I want to transmit only positivity right up until kick off. Then, when I’m in the ground, I’ll be a bundle of nerves. But until that point, I have nothing but positive vibes of success that I want to transmit to Mikel Arteta and his team.

And it is a team with whom, if some of the pictures doing the rounds on social media yesterday and this morning showed Martin Odegaard in training, as well as Jurrien Timber. And if both are fit to make the match-day squad, I think one of them will definitely start.

That’s Timber for me. Because if Guardiola is going to opt for Doku on that left wing for City, it just feels like having Jurrien up against him is the best chance we’ve got of neutralising him. Odegaard may be back in training, but he hasn’t played since coming on against The Scum for 13 minutes on 22nd February. A month ago. In fact, you have to go back to the 3-2 defeat against United almost a month before that, to see his first game from the start, so I just can’t see it today. In fact, given the limitations of the squad you can name for this cup final, I’d be wondering if he’s even ready for the bench. If you can only get 10 – 15 minutes out of Odegaard, shouldn’t his space in the match-day squad be taken up by another?

That’s a decision Arteta is going to have to make today, but if his captain is fit and he can get something from him, my gut feeling says he will make the squad.

So, who else plays today, then, eh?

Firstly, the keeper situation, which basically every Arsenal fan I was listening to on podcasts this week has been debating. The media also asked him the question during his press conference on Friday. Of course, he wouldn’t be drawn on it, but I have a feeling he goes with Kepa today. I’m not sure it’s the right move, hopefully it doesn’t come back to bite us on the arse, but I go back to his arrival in the summer, and I can’t help but think it is a situation like today that is the reason Kepa signed for us in the first place. He was number one at Bournemouth; he could have signed for them or another club and been their number one, but he chose Arsenal, knowing that he 99% won’t displace Raya. But if Arteta had a conversation with him and told him he’s the cup keeper, all the way to domestic finals, then I think he will honour that, and we’ll see the other Spaniard in goal today.

And I think I’m fine with it. Providing, of course, we see know ricks in him…

I’ve named Timber in at right back, and I think the two centre halves speak for themselves, but who to put in at left back, I wonder…

**taps finger on chin in a pondering fashion**

I think it might be Calafiori, you know. I think Arteta will want to have a little bit more chaos in the final third with his inside channel runs, and I think that means it will be the Italian over the Ecuadorian. It doesn’t mean Hincapie won’t see minutes – I absolutely think he will – but I think for the first 60 – 70 of this game, he will be tasked with getting into those pockets of position similarly to last season’s 2-2 draw at the Etihad, where he scored. His task for the day will be keeping an eye on Semenyo, I suspect – no easy feet.

In front of them, I think it’s fairly obvious that Rice and Zubimendi start, and I think Eze is pretty much nailed on for his position too, after his fine display against Leverkusen. He was on the ball more, involved, plus we saw just how hard he can hit the ball if given the chance. But let’s also not forget that Eze has good recent memories of this stadium. This was the scene of his ascension to cult hero status for Palace fans in May and I watched that goal again this morning. It’s a great finish, running onto a cross as City were in transition, and his stroking the ball home was perfectly timed. Another one of those would be great. He was also there for Palace’s 2-2 penalty win in the Community Shield last August, so I’m sure he’s more than happy about his time at Wembley in the last year. Let’s hope he can transmit some of that this afternoon.

The attack has another couple of questions to ask about it, too. Not Saka, I don’t think, but I do think that there is a question over whether it’s Kai or Big Vik, and, despite his good showing in midweek against Leverkusen, if it was my choice, it would be Havertz all day long. He will bring other wide forwards into play, he will be a handful in the air for those City defenders, plus he put in a super display at Wembley in the Community Shield for his Arsenal debut too. So it has to be the German who leads the line. And so to that left-wing spot, in which nobody has really nailed it so far. But I’m thinking it will be Trossard. Again, he combined well at home against Leverkusen, plus I liked how he was drifting a little more, and I think rotation across our attacking players is key today. We need to get at the likes of Nunes and probably Khusanov, because both are players with obvious strengths, but also weaknesses too. Nunes is a physical presence and likes to be aggressive in the press, but he isn’t always the most consistent and I’ve seen people suggest he does have an error or two in him. Khusanov is rapid, but he too has mistakes in him.

Man City can be ‘got at’. We’ve seen it all this season, but we need to see it today, and I think the first goal is massive in this one. At the Emirates earlier in the season, City got their goal with pretty much their first attack and then just sat in the lowest block that has ever been recorded by a Pep Guardiola side. They were away from home and they could see how dominant we were and it was only a late bit of magic that salvaged a point for us. What that meant is that we couldn’t truly test what City are like running back towards their own goal, as many teams have already done this season since that day. If they score first, I think they will be a similar variant of that City team that day, although I expect them to create a few more chances. But if we score first…well…that will 100% bring them on to us and that’s where we need to take advantage of the inevitable space that crops up.

It’s so hard to call. I keep chopping and changing my mind on how this one will play out. But what we all have to remember is that this is just the start of the ‘business end’ run in for triphy attempts. This is the cherry on the cake, before we’ve even got the cake fully prepped yet. So I’m going to try my hardest not to be too down if we lose, but equally, not to be too high if we win.

But if we could just win, yeah Arsenal? That would be great.

Back tomorrow for a debrief. Let’s hope it is a happy one.

Well, from a form perspective, they’re in pretty good nick. A win at home against Burnley the week before last was preceded by a win away at Newcastle, although they did lose at home to United before that, as well as Bournemouth at home with a man sent off. The form table tells us that they are seventh in terms of their last four games, ninth in their last six games, and then sixth in their last eight games. So it’s a bit of mixed form for a Toffees side who currently sit eighth in the table and have really stabilised themselves under David Moyes. West Ham fans wouldn’t like to admit it, but I bet they’d give their right arm to go back in time and have the Scot stay on as manager a little longer than he did after helping them lift the Europa Conference League a few years back.

I watched their game against Newcastle, and although Newcastle were poor, it gave a clear indication of what we’re going to see from Everton tomorrow. This will be low block, deep defence, transitional counter-attacking attempts. Or at least holding us for a shutout. They may have changed the manager from when they last came to the Emirates last season, but the aim remains the same: Low block the shizzle out of this one. That’s what they did against Newcastle, that’s what they did against us with Dyche, that’s what they’ll do once again – and the numbers feel like the support this:

• Fifth lowest xG in the whole league – they don’t create a lot of good chances
• Ninth highest xG against – they’re a solid mid-table team when it comes to conceding high-quality chances
• Fifth lowest average possession in the league – they don’t want the ball, they don’t keep the ball
• Fifth lowest ‘dangerous possession lost’ in the league (we are the lowest) – they don’t tend to make too many mistakes in their defensive positions.

I get these stats from MARKSTATS, by the way, which helps me to get an understanding of what we’re up against. But by all accounts, it feels like a defensively disciplined side who will sit in their shape and ask the likes of Gueye and Garner to tuck in and protect the defence, whilst McNeill and Ndiaye will be their counter-attacking wingers who will look to set the big man Beto in. They’ll look for set pieces to unsettle us (they have the third most shots from set pieces in the whole Premier League – we are fourth), because despite me saying that they’ll look for Beto, they actually have the lowest number of fast breaks in the league. Going on this initial assessment of some top-line data, this already feels like it is going to be a very attritional game for The Arsenal. I’m sure Arteta is ready for that, but are the media, when they once again accuse us of being boring when the opposition side has sat in their own half for most of the game?

Their fans are understandably buoyant after back-to-back wins, with a quick check on one of their fan forums giving us things like:

The pressure on them could work in our favour and let’s be honest they haven’t looked great lately.
I’m hoping our confidence will beat their nerves

And

We got battered there last year but somehow managed to get a 0-0 draw. I would take that again

And

Beto passes a sublime, curled injury time winner to start the Annual arsenal campaign rot. Followed by 15min delay as VAR team take the unusual step of a passport check to confirm it’s actually Beto.

0-1.

Jack Grealish has caused us problems over the years, but he’s injured, which is a bonus. I do think Ndiaye is a decent player. I had him in my FPL team at the start of the season, and he racked up a fair few points for me with his penalty goals and set pieces. He’s one to keep an eye on, I think. I also find it ironic that their fans are talking about Arsenal scrums in the penalty box, after we saw the game against Man United be probably even worse between those two sides. I do wonder if we’re getting to a point in the season, however, where a referee will select a game to make an example of. This feels like the sort of game where that might happen, be it a penalty for either side. I hope I’m wrong.

The pundits are – as you’d expect – giving Arsenal the edge in this one. Merse has gone for a 2-1 in which we edge it, Lewis Jones says it’ll be a 2-0, citing Moyes’ away form in these big games as not being that great. Sutton also thinks it’ll be 2-0, saying that Everton will make it difficult, there might be a chance of fatigue, but our squad should see us through. Which I kind of get. What’s interesting is that a lot of these guys are also predicting City to drop points away to West Ham. I’m not sure I see that. I get it, they will be down after Real Madrid, and they’ve had to travel back from Spain on Wednesday, before coming down to the capital, with West Ham having their feet up, but I just don’t see City dropping points tomorrow – that’s why we have to take care of our business first. If we slip up with a defeat or a draw, it gives City a boost before they even kick off. If they know that they cannot do anything other than win tomorrow night, maybe it makes those muscles a little more tense and tight. That’s the opportunity we have, and that’s what Mikel Arteta must be instructing on his players.

I’ll leave it there for now. I’m back as usual tomorrow, and I’ll catch you all then when we all know what the team news is, and can start the guesswork on how Arteta will set the team up.

The problem is, it takes two to tango, and Bayer Leverkusen were in no mind to make it an open and easy game for us.

I guess where I’m at this morning after that 1-1 draw in the Bayer Arena, is that it’s a decent draw and leaves us with the minor advantage of home soil for what effectively becomes a one-off knock out game now. That’s how I reflected on it to The Management when she came home last night and said “What does this mean now?” after I told her the result. With the abolition of the away goal rule, the home leg for us becomes the equivalent of an FA Cup round; there’s no need for mental gymnastics, or the psychology of being a goal or two up – it’s just them versus us and if it’s level after 90, then we go to extra time, followed by pens.

And if you look at the way we played in the main last night, you probably have to say “I’ll take that”. We weren’t great. We had our passing structures all set up, Eze was finding pockets of space deeper, getting on the ball. But I suspect that’s exactly what Bayer wanted. He’s not a guy who dictates from deep. He’s somebody who comes alive in the final third and last night he was probably a little too far from it, a little too often, for my liking.

I thought he had a decent-ish game though, which cannot be said across our front line. Martinelli had the best chance right up until Kai put the ball on the penalty spot to draw us level late on in the game, but his shot off the bar was about it from the Brazilian; it was another frustrating one in which I don’t think he beat his man often enough (when he did he drew a yellow card from the Leverkusen right back, but he never built on that, which is disappointing), and spent a lot of time checking back and slowing the play.

Big Vik started brightly and used good strength within a minute to leave Andrick on a yellow (who might have seen red if his body check on the same Arsenal player would have been 30 minutes later instead of three) early on and he had a couple of early touches and lay-offs that I thought meant we might get one of the better performances from the Swede, but that soon faded away.

But the biggest surprise of the night was just how poor Saka was. In fact, he was so poor, that people on my social media timeline were questioning whether he was fit or not. The manager never alluded to anything in his post-match press conference, and in fact, he even hinted (or so I thought) at the reason Madueke came on being the poor performance of the Starboy. It was just so odd; he never beat his man, his passing was off, he was slowing the play down and it seemed like he’d run out of ideas. One or two of us have touched on the fact we need him to step up, because he’s our best player, but this season has so far been quite underwhelming. And yesterday’s game felt like it was a point in which more people are going to start questioning him.

His replacement Madueke made an instant impact. He was beating his man, which is his bread and butter, and the move which led to the penalty was excellent. I thought the pen itself was super soft, although in real time it looked like a stonewaller to me, but when you see the replay you’re getting quite annoyed that’s it’s given if it’s against you. Mind you, the referee was terrible all night and gave silly fouls and ridiculous yellows all night. Zubimendi’s and Havertz’s were a case in point; how on earth Kai got booked for standing his ground in the penalty box is beyond me. So maybe we shouldn’t be so surprised that he gave that penalty.

It was a relief to bag it, and kudos to Kai for the cajones to step up against his old club and deliver, but it felt like we’d got away with that draw in the end. The stats and efforts overall tell of a game pretty evenly matched though, so perhaps the draw is just the footballing gods appreciating and recognising that neither side really deserved it on the night. Leverkusen caught us cold at the beginning of the second half with their corner goal (Jover will have them all in doing lines on the blackboard this morning, for sure), we caught them out late with a bit of trickery from Noni. One cancelled the other out and we go again on Tuesday evening next week at The Emirates.

I’m not really sure what else there is to reflect on in that game. It wasn’t a classic, Bayer were set up to contain us and then hit us on the counter with Kofane proving a handful for a surprisingly shaky looking Saliba and Gabriel, but they didn’t really have a ton of work to do when you think back over the chances created. Raya made one worldie of a save, I’ve mentioned Martinelli’s crossbar challenge effort, but other than that I can’t remember either side creating a ton and deserving to win this game outright.

That needs to change in six days’ time though. And we need to see a better performance on Saturday too.

Back tomorrow as we look ahead to that tricky one against Everton.

Tottingham Popspurs, my-oh-my, what on earth? Even during the most banterous of Banter Era moments, I don’t remember us doing what they did last night. Three Champions League goals conceded in the first 15 minutes for the first time ever, I believe. A goalkeeper subbed off after 15 minutes for the first time ever. A Spurs side who have now lost six on the bounce in all competitions. And a manager who was supposed to be the short term ‘fixer’, now being heckled by a fanbase who in the last month have talked about ending the season, but now all believe that there is a massive chance they go down.

I can’t remember if I’ve talked about it on here, but I would love it if they went down. Love it. There are Arsenal fans talking about how we’d lose a guaranteed six points, about the joys of the North London Derby being unmatched, and about how it is good to have them in the Premier League for us. Not for me. Whack them down to the Championship, please.

That’s 245 words of today’s match day musings that I’ve wasted on that club, so let’s get to The Arsenal now, shall we? Arteta and Havertz (understandably, given his history with Leverkusen) were the ones up in front of the media yesterday, and thankfully, it appears as though some of the knocks from the weekend and players missing from training were exactly as we’d all hoped – nothing serious and rest has been had. So we have Gabriel, Saliba, Raya, Zubimendi, Rice, Calafiori and Trossard all available for selection tonight. Charles Watts also reported that Ben White travelled with the squad, so that’s great news as well. Hopefully, he can get some minutes today, because I do think Arteta is going to have to keep Jurrien Timber from breaking down by limiting his minutes if he can. White is a good player, has been a great servant for us in his time so far, but he’s already shown his body can’t handle being the sole breadwinner on that right hand side, so Arteta needs to make sure he keeps both players as fresh as possible by giving them minutes.

I think the rest of the team is going to be largely easy to predict, with just a question on left wing and left back. I’m thinking Arteta will go for:

Raya

Timber   –   Saliba   –   Gabriel   –   Hincapie

Zubimendi

Eze   –   Rice

Saka   –   Gyokeres   –   Trossard

I think Hincapie’s form, plus Arteta not wanting to risk Calafiori, suggests the Ecuadorian might get the nod. He’s not cup-tied, given that technically Leverkusen are still his club, but that’s all the more reason to start him, I think. He’ll have some extra impetus and incentive to demonstrate how his career is kicking on, and his form is such that he deserves that start. On the left this is a tricky one. In the Champions League, Martinelli has been bagging goals, and with teams often pressing high (especially at home) it feels as though there’s more space for him to exploit. But I’ve gone with Trossard because:

1. I think he works better with Gyokeres
2. I think Leverkusen are going to go more compact tonight and look to contain Arsenal

They may be at home, but if they are solid defensively and can limit us in a lower block, then the pressure switches to us at The Emirates. Thankfully, the away goal rule is done, so it does mean that Leverkusen can’t do the ol’ “draw 0-0 at home and 1-1 away and go through” that felt like it was one of the more rubbish things about the 90s and 2000s Champions League. But the gameplan can still be similar; stay in the tie in the first leg, then see if the supposed ‘favourites’ crack under the pressure on their own turf. It’s how I would set up tonight.

I’ve watched a couple of good tactical videos, including this one here, so it appears as though we’re going to get a back three from Leverkusen with two floating 10s supporting their front man. They’ll rely on their wing-backs for width and in Grimaldo, they have a quality player who this season is their second top scorer in all competitions with 12 goals. Not bad for a left wing-back, eh? There’s a question mark over their main man, Patrik Schick, who has been out with a muscular injury for the last couple of games, but their coach confirmed he trained yesterday and so will be in the squad. I talked about the strengths of the guy who might replace him yesterday, but if Schick is available and starts, it will be a different prospect for Gabriel and Salba. He’s about six foot three and is good in the air; he’ll be a strong link-up man for them in bringing those two tens in place, and if they utilise their wing-backs as we think they might.

Apparently, one of the challenges Bayer has is that they haven’t really rotated their first XI much this season, so I have read, with one report saying that Grimaldo has openly talked about how fatigued he is. We have to hope that is the case tonight, especially given that Saka only came on as a sub at the weekend. I hope he’s fresher than the Spaniard and that his penchant for venturing forward leaves space in behind, becaus eit feels like that might be an area of the pitch we could take advantage of.

Nothing is decided tonight, but we know full well, having seen Bayern smash Atalanta and Atletico dispatch the Scum, that you can very well put yourself with one foot out of Europe if you don’t get the duels right and the tactics spot on. Leverkusen have already beaten Man City away (something we haven’t done in about 10 years!), as well as drawn at home to Newcastle and beaten Villareal on their own patch too. They are a decent side in their own ground, so Mikel Arteta needs tobe very wary of that.

Catch you all tomorrow for the usual debrief.

Today we’ll have the managers’ press conference, which will give us an update on team news, which won’t be very telling on our side. But as I sort of touched on yesterday, it is Chelsea’s team that I am more interested in knowing who is available. For us, the main question will centre around whether Havertz can make the match-day squad, with Mikel Arteta saying last week that he had the outside chance of making the game against the Scum. We’re a week later now and so my hopes are that we get some good news, although we need to be ready to hear a ‘not-a-lot’ update from Arteta; I think he’ll say the same as last week, which could mean anything. The reports of the Havertz injury came out around 12th February, so if he was due to miss a month, that puts him as possibly available next weekend at best, I would suggest. Let’s just hope for some good news, though, anyway, eh?

So, as we head into this weekend’s set of fixtures, what are the pundits saying about our hopes?

Well, Lewis Jones on Sky Sports thinks we’ll get a clean sheet in a 2-0 win, and whilst I’d love to say that it’s music to mine ears, he’s also predicted a West Ham win at Liverpool (never gonna happen), and a Man City draw away at Leeds. I was at a leaving do last night for a mate who is a Leeds fan. We had a chat about the game tomorrow, and I asked him what the chances are of Leeds doing us a favour. To my surprise, he said, “You never know – it’s under the lights as a 5.30 pm kick off, we have a team of big bastards you boot people around, the crowd get massively up for night games, so there might be a chance. Or we’ll be down 3-0 within 15 minutes” – so I liked what he said other than the last bit!

Lewis Jones also said we’d draw 1-1 away at the Scum last week, so I guess his predictions are there to be taken with a pinch of salt. Chris Sutton is going with a 2-0, but his guest – some dude from Neighbours – went for 2-2, and the BBC AI-generated predictor said 2-2 as well, which I thought was interesting because most people don’t really predict Arsenal conceding for obvious reasons. But when you stop and look at 2026, clean sheets have been harder to come by, so predicting that Chelsea will score is probably not too wide of the mark. In every game in 2026, it has felt as though the opposition have one wonder strike in them, or Arsenal have a shoot-oneself-in-the-foot moment, so you wouldn’t bank on that not happening this weekend, would you?

Merse has gone for a closer encounter with a 1-0 to The Arsenal, whereas Mark Lawrenson has gone with a 3-1 Arsenal. Of all of the scores, that’s the one I feel could be on the cards the most, for the aforementioned Arsenal, conceding silly goals or worldies rule. Could also be a 2-1, but obviously, the more we score, the better, and so I’m hoping for some manifestation of my prediction.

What about those Chelsea fans? though? How are they feeling ahead of this one?

Well, the first one I came across on a forum had this to say:

We’ll have no Cucu, no Estevao, no Fofana, a seriously off form Caicedo and a poorly off form Palmer. Only way we score is if Arse sh*t the bed themselves

Yes please! I’ll take that! I didn’t know about Estevao, but apparently, he missed Burnley with a hamstring issue, so let’s hope that remains true. Having scrolled through a couple of pages of fan comments, it’s fair to say they aren’t too happy with their new manager, Liam. The crux of what I’ve just read is:

• They really don’t rate that Tosin fella at the back, and shortly behind him, they don’t really fancy Badiashile
• They fear that Rosenior will just replicate the League Cup tactics
• They seem convinced somebody from Chelsea is getting sent off

One of the forums has a poll of the score and has it as 56% of Chelsea fans thinking it’ll be a win for us, 18% think a draw and 25% think they’ll win. So the odds, even with the Chelsea fans, seem to be stacked in our favour, but they were massively against United, Wolves, Brentford and Forest, and look how that turned out, so we need to be mindful of these prediction routines. Instead, let’s look to the data on Chelsea, which again is quite difficult, given that Rosenior is still forging the identity for his new team. The stats tell us that behind City and us, Chelsea have scored the most goals. It tells us that they haven’t, however, had a ton of shots and sit fifth in the table, having had 43 fewer shots than us this season, and 13 fewer on target. They average more possession than us and sit third in the league, whilst also having attempted 1,101 passes more than us so far. The picture is starting to form on them over the whole season – they want to keep more of the ball than us for sure. They lead the league for passes per defensive active (PPDA), which means they allow the least amount of time for an opponent to be on the ball before engaging them, but only just behind us. Defensively is where they have challenges, sitting firmly in mid-table with their xG allowed, whilst also having the highest average xG allowed per shot – so in other words, of every team in the Premier League, Chelsea do give their opposition high-quality chances.

So we have a bit of a picture here from the whole season. But what has Rosenior done for himself in the 11 or so games he’s managed for them? Well, apparently, he’s given more reigns to Andrey Santos to do the defensive midfield work, which means Caicedo can go hunting for the ball and pop up across different areas of the pitch with more regularity. Enzo Fernandez no longer sits alongside him, but in the left half-space. The teams do, apparently, also have less structure about them compared to Maresca, in which it was seen as a bit of a millstone around their neck at times. They appear to be good in patches, but I found what Merse said a couple of weeks back interesting on Sky Sports – that they couldn’t string a 90-minute match together. I don’t want to say that feels similar to us, because it clearly isn’t, but at times in 2026 so far, it has felt as though we kind of just give up first halves, expecting to then do the business in the second. That’s not how you qualify for the Champions League in Chelsea’s case, and it’s certainly not how you win a league title in ours, so my hope is that we won’t see that this weekend like we did in the League Cup – i.e. a cagey nothing game, certainly in that first half.

In that game, however, we didn’t have to go for it. This weekend, if we want those three points, we really do.

Right, that’s enough waffle from me for one day. I’m off to do some work. You have a great Friday, and I’ll be back tomorrow when we know the possible team updates, as well as who we’ll have in the Champions League draw, which will happen this morning at some stage no doubt.

Arsenal is picking up all three points in the North London Derby.

I’ve woken up feeling achy, with a headache, which means I think I’m coming down with something. I really don’t want this feeling to be compounded by further disappointment as Arsenal find themselves even closer to Man City.

I’ve said it before, and I’ve been saying it for many seasons, but I hate this fixture. Every year. No matter how good/shocking we are, this fixture is always tough; it is always a horrible experience, and I’m going to hate basically all of it until the final whistle ,and if we’ve won it.

So this is my plea to those Arsenal players today:

Win. And win well. You have millions of Arsenal fans all over the globe investing themselves emotionally into you, providing us with the joy we all dream of so much come 6.30 pm tonight.

The analysis has been done. The tactics have been drawn out by Arteta and his coaching staff. The players have had their training sessions pre-game. Now it is about going out there, with that cannon on the chest, and doing the business.

I believe in this Arsenal team. I am behind these players. I think they can win today.

We have a better team. We are top of the league for a reason. Those players need to look at themselves in the mirror and look at how great they are. At how hard they’ve worked. At why they have been sat so high in the Premier League up until this point. It isn’t a coincidence; it’s because you are all brilliant, and as a fanbase, we love you. So take that love, take that support, take that collective demand and use it to fuel you to victory. The Scum have a huge injury list. They have circa 14 first-teamers fit. They are yet to win in 2026. So use that Arsenal, use a potential frailty in their mentality to start fast, quieten the crowd, make them lose their belief, because they are going to be making that stadium very loud today from kick off. They have a new manager, a guy who will instantly give their fans a boost and hope for a new manager bounce, but we have to quash that as soon as possible.

Our team will be, I think, this one that lines up from the start:

Raya

Timber   –   Saliba   –   Gabriel   –   Calafiori

Zubimendi

Odegaard   –   Rice

Saka   –   Gyokeres   –   Trossard

Personally, I’d go with White instead of Timber after the Dutch international’s second-half performance (clearly brought on by extreme fatigue), as well as Trossard for Marrtinelli after the Brazilian’s disasterclass against Wolves. Hincapie was great, but I think somebody like Calafiori popping up in those inside channels when we are on the attack is the sort of thing that will unsettle a makeshift Tottenham back line. If they go with the same side that lost to Newcastle at home a week-and-a-half ago, then it will be the young midfielder Archie Gray in at right back. He’s been apparently quite good, but if you’re Leo Trossard and you’re getting help from the likes of Calafiori in that area of the pitch, you’re surely hoping that they should get the better of their opponents.

Where the game might be won is that midfield battle. The Scum will go with Sarr, they will go with Gallagher, they will go with Paulinha, and maybe Simons too. That midfield is workman-like. They will chase everything, they will hassle, they will harry, so we need to be able to move the ball quickly in the middle of the park to ensure that they are just running around without any structure. They will be intense in this game; we need to box clever in this game. They are going to move the ball from back-tofront quickly, I think. So we need to be ready for that, particularly if there is space behind. If they do, then perhaps there’s an option for Martinelli from the bench, but I don’t think you can start him based on his previous performance, and also because we don’t know what Tudor is going to do. When the first 15 – 30 minutes have unfolded, we’ll know what this Tottenham team is like.

I have watched a couple of tactical videos from neutrals and their fans, and the message they have is clear:

We need to have a go at Arsenal, we can’t sit deep in a low block like so many teams. We need to press them.

Providing we don’t go into panic stations like the second half against Wolves, that’s going to give us chances in behind if that is how the crowd and the manager demand his team drive forward.

I really hope this game is open from a Tottenham perspective. If it is, then it will be about our forward line delivering in a critical game, so we need some of those players to step up. Get chances, take your chances, win the game.

Please.

I’m not really sure what else there is to say at this point. The talking has been done for everyone. Now it is time to go out and do your talking on the pitch. With the football.

Come on, Arsenal – I believe in you.

As I’m not feeling too well, I won’t be on the Same Old Arsenal podcast after the game, but if you want an instant reaction, you can see Amanda, James, and Mervyn, who will be giving their thoughts. I’ll be back tomorrow for a debrief/post-mortem.

Catch you guys then. Fingers crossed, people.

I guess the club was also hoping that official announcements of star player signing a new deal would also appease us. Thankfully, because of my curated timeline, I have plenty of sensible people who could divorce themselves from one thing relating to another and there was plenty of love for Bukayo, whilst still being grumpy about that midweek draw to the worst Premier League Team in history.

Then on Sunday we play what some of their fans are calling the worst Spurs team in Premier League history. I don’t buy that for a second. They are better than the sum of their collective parts have shown and, with the NLD needing no motivation, they will show it against us on Sunday for sure. Perhaps Mikel can use that motivation to turn a corner for this Arsenal team? I certainly hope so. The pundits still think we’ll win, though. Sutton predicted 3-0 on Sunday, which I just cannot see in a million years, whilst his guest went for 3-2 to The Arsenal. Merse has gone for 2-1, but Lewis Jones has said 2-1 to them on Sky Sports.

The Opta supercomputer – which I’ll be honest and admit I’m starting to hate right now – is telling us that we have a 60.1% chance of winning that game. I don’t really buy that given our form, their home, as well as a new manager, bounce that has already hit us once this season with Michael-friggin’-Carrick at The Emirates.

Their fans are kind of seeing it as a free hit. I get that. They won’t go down, they’re too good I think, so all they probably ned is two or three wins this season and they’re fine. I think they’ll get that, but will one of them be this weekend? If ever there was an incentive for them, it would be to hand the title advantage to City, so I am expecting their fans to be massively up for that. That club lives for other teams; they focus on making sure we don’t win anything, as 2023/24 showed, so Arteta needs to be preparing for this game as if he’s playing a team and a fanbase who are challenging for the title with us.

So then, what about this new manager? What’s he going to do? Well, he does apparently like a bit of a ‘new manager bounce’, which I bet will be the prevailing narrative on Sunday pre-kick off. He’s been hired midway through a season seven out of his last eight times and has had success at Juve, Lazio and twice managed to avoid the drop for Udinese. He tends to go with a back three and wing-backs, so I expect that’s what we’ll see on Sunday, with man-to-man pressing. That could be interesting, because if he does that, it means there are individual battles that could be won and that will be intriguing for our wide-forwards. It’s also what completely knocked them out of the game at The Emirates, with us three-up at halftime before Frank switched to a back four.

The benefit Tudor has had is that he’s had enough time to drill positions and disciplines into their team. This isn’t going to be a case like it was with Big Ange where he joined and then two days later for Forest they played us and hadn’t quite adapted to the system. There’s certainly an element of ‘you have to do it in a game’, but they will have been training their arses off this last week to be drilled well-enough to execute Tudor’s vision. We also tend to do quite well against.

The data tells us one thing, but I don’t know that it is what we’re gonna get on Sunday. It tells us that the Scum have the fourth-worst xG in the whole league. But then again, so did Wolves and they still managed two against us. They have also taken the sixth-worst number of shots so far this season. Where they are good, like us, is through set-pieces and the Scum have the fourth-best goal conversion from set pieces of any team in the league – 13 all season (we have 16). They also don’t seem to be too great when it comes to fast breaks; they’ve had 13 all season and have only scored in two – this tells me they aren’t a transitional side that will hit us on the counter again and again.

But this is where the data belies the reality, because we just don’t know with Tudor what he will do. If his previous roles is anything to go by, I’ve sort of outlined what some of what we might see above, but if they are also pressing high and with a man-to-man approach, my hope is that it will favour our increased propensity this season for going direct. Maybe, just maybe, this could finally be a ‘Big Vik’ big game? Let’s hope so, because for at least 80% of games this season, his performances have left me feeling a little, well, ‘meh’. If he is fed the ball and has enough green grass to run into with a high man-to-man press by The Scum, then he just has to win his own battle for us to potentially profit.

I hate this fixture. You’re going to hear me say that a lot over the next 48 hours. It makes me more nervous than anything and with the unknown quantity being added in here, as well as our performance in midweek, where at the beginning of the week I said this could be season-defining for us, the first part already hasn’t gone to plan, which means that the ‘season-defining’ part could be for all the wrong reasons. Let’s hope not on Sunday.

The countdown to this game is well and truly on. Let’s hear what the managers say in their press conferences today.

Until tomorrow.

We know what people think about set pieces, about how it’s “ruining the game”, but I’m not going to even remotely posit that notion this morning. Brentford have weapons, and they use them very well, not least those throw-ins, which are essentially corners in themselves. And we suffered from it with the equaliser they scored from. It’s funny because on the balance of the 90, you have to say that it was the least they deserved, but I thought in that second half we had bested them for most of the opening period and about five minutes after we scored through Madueke’s goal (which I thought took an age to actually drop into the net). So half of me was thinking that Brentford scored against the run of play, but on balance, it was just in that period of the game, because Brentford had the most of it.

It’s fair to say we weren’t really at it yesterday. The early seeds were sewn within a couple of minutes when Big Gabby passed the ball out of play for a corner. Raya had one or two wobbly moments too, including a ridiculous roll out to Rice for which Thiago nearly scored from the cross that came in. But the odd thing about Raya, right, is that he often does this – he’ll make a cock up, then instantly redeem himself with a worldie save. So you don’t know whether to be pissed off at him for his error, or delighted for him at his brilliant save. Just do the latter more than the former, mate, alright?

That first half really pissed me off, too. I’m starting to get wound up by how we just give up halves of football. It’s happened so many times this season; the first half is reduced to a kind of non-event, with the only real chance being Thiago’s header, which shouldn’t have happened in the first place. Brentford ended the first half on 0.41xG and I’ll be all of that chance creation probability came from that one effort. Conversely, we created one shot in that first half, as we just let it pass us by. That’s not what Champions-elect do. They go to a ground like last night, into a difficult night atmosphere, with the crowd up, and they bore the f*ck out of them by scoring early and shutting the game down. But we just couldn’t get players on the ball in the right spaces. Eze was anonymous. Gyokeres was okayish, with the most ludicrous yellow card I’ve ever seen in my life, whilst Madueke looked like he didn’t know how to best Rico Henry. One thing you have to say about Noni is that he knows how to beat a man, but last night I thought he struggled with Henry’s touch-tight man-marking. You have to give the Brentford left-back some props for that. The thing Noni isn’t good at is delivering end product, so it was weird that on a night in which is primary asset was nullified, he was the one who actually delivered end product. Weird. If you could just combine the two from now on, Noni, that’d be grand lad.

Brentford closed the spaces we wanted to be in, then left big gaps in the middle of the park and we just didn’t get into those spaces. I guess that’s because they go from back-to-front so quickly and they don’t really need the middle of the park because they go long so much, but you’d have thought Arteta would have had a plan to answer that. Perhaps he did and the team just didn’t execute, because for the 15 minutes after halftime and until we scored, we pretty much dominated. Most of our chances came then, except the Rice chance just after we’d scored, which he probably should have put his laces through it instead of trying to find Big Vik. Brentford defended stoutly and deep into their box as I’d said in my pre-match blog, the chance therefore went a-begging.

But after that we retreated again. If we cock up this Premier League campaign, we won’t specifically look back at this one as one in which the title was lost, but we will lament those times we couldn’t get that second goal to see off a game. We did that last weekend against Sunderland, but certainly in 2026 so far, it really feels like we just haven’t done enough to kill off a game. That leads me to another point of discussion: Our 2026 form. Brentford have more points than we do this year. We’ve drawn three, lost one, won two. It’s patchy. It’s stodgy, a bit like our football in the first half and were we a little more authoritative in games like this, I wouldn’t be as worried as I am. Which sounds mad, right? I mean we’re four points clear at the top, 12 games to go, we’re rightly lauded as the best team so far’ this season and we suffered an off night. Normally you have a game like this and you say “ahh, it happens”. But Liverpool in the second half. Forest away. United at home. Now Brentford away. It’s the patter of these performances that worries me more than the actual result itself. If we’d played last night, hit the post, ‘keeper has the game of his life, we create chance-after-chance, Brentford hang on and we are left ruing missed chances, then you can say that. But that didn’t happen. Brentford probably created the better chances than us, save for the one right at the end with Martinelli. In the moment I was like “you have to score those”, but on watching the replays, it was a good save from the Brentford ‘keeper, so perhaps you have to give it.

1,000 words in and I’m still no further in my thinking as to whether I’m still grumpy or I want to do a little ‘Perspective FC’ tonight on the Same Old Arsenal pod. Join in and listen at 6pm UK time if you want to find out.

I’ll be

But the really painful news was the Havertz stuff. Out for about a month. Having just come back and looking so slick too. We’ve seen this before when players come back; they have a few games, then pick up a muscular injury, and Arsenal were deliberately holding him back from games to avoid it. But I guess you just never know how the human body is going to react and clearly Havertz’s isn’t reacting amazingly. It’s funny (not funny) because Havertz has not had a lot of injuries in his career, but it seems like the second Arteta uttered the words along the lines of “he’s a machine” when it came to Havertz’s fitness, it feels like he’s had one injury after the other. His arrival back into the team was also co-inciding with some pretty imperious-looking performances. And now we’ve lost him again.

Honestly, are we not allowed nice things? Only a couple of weeks ago, we were saying that Arteta had a full squad at his disposal, bar Max Dowman. Now we’re looking at the possibility of not having the following available for tonight’s game to Brentford:

• Havertz
• Odegaard
• Saka
• Trossard

That’s a big chunk of our attacking threat, although what I will say is that this is a worst-case scenario, because Arteta would only say when asked yesterday, “we’ll see” about Odegaard and Saka. I suspect the “we’ll see” relates more to Odegaard than Saka, because the reporting from the sources saying they are targeting the Scum game weekend after next is usually quite accurate. So perhaps we get bolstered by Martin’s return, but given there was nothing in the written transcription on Trossard, hopefully he’s fine. I haven’t had the chance to look at any training pics yet.

So on the assumption of Trossard being fit and Odegaard being a ‘maybe’, this is what I have gone for as a starting XI that I’d like to see tonight at Brentford:

Raya

Timber   –   Saliba   –   Gabriel   –   Califiori

Zubimendi

Eze   –   Rice

Madueke   –   Gyokeres   –   Trossard

I toyed with the idea of Odegaard coming in, but I’m thinking he’ll do a job-share with Eze, perhaps either way around. I just think that Eze is more suited to get the best out of Big Vik, then on the left flank, Trossard seems to be on a similar wavelength to the Swede (think that sumptuous ball in behind that Gyokeres didn’t quite get the shot off against Leeds a couple of weeks back). I think we need to ‘lean in’ to the good form of the Swede and I’m just not sure that has come with Odegaard. He was the one I thought would be the guy to feed our number 14, but I feel like I just haven’t seen enough of it. But we have with Eze. So let’s go with that for an hour and see if it works. Gabby Jesus didn’t do enough to win his place, Merino is out, Gyokeres only got 30 minutes against Sunderland, so he should be fresher.

Regardless of the starting XI though, Arteta has been at pains this season to point out that the finishers can also be as important as the starters and, dare I say it, they are probably more important than those who get go kick off. Just think about the Sunderland game and the impact the subs had there – they turned it from a nervy 1-0, to what in the end looked like a comfy 3-0 victory at home.

And I do think tonight will be nervy. Brentford are a good team. A solid team. A team who know set pieces almost as well as we do and in Kayode get a de facto corner every time they get a throw in. They’ll be leaning into that, as well as a rapid counter and interestingly, they also might not deploy Thiago as I was thinking they might. On my run this morning I listened to the preview section of the Beesotted podcast and towards the end they had an interesting discussion about how Thiago plays the target man in some games, but in others he’s happy to drop deeper and feed the pacey wide men. If you think about how they might sit in tonight and rely on the counter, it’s something that I think Arteta has to be mindful of.

Last night City did their bit to ratchet up the pressure. Tonight the players need to be as cool, calm and collected, as Arteta seemed in his press conference.

Fingers crossed tomorrow we’re talking about a victory – by any means necessary.

Catch you all tomorrow morning for a de-brief, then I might see if I can get some peeps on for the Same Old Arsenal pod in the evening.

Tottenham Hotspur.

HAHAHAHAHAHA.

I fully realise their next game is against us. I fully realise that there is absolutely zero chance they are as dire as they have been at home all season. I fully realise that there’s no way they will be as terrible – conceding 2.48xG to Newcastle, 21 shots, five on target, two big chances missed for the Geordies – against us. I also realise that we may have to face our old foe, New Manager bounce, because Thomas Frank sounded like a beaten man in his post-match presser. But if you can’t laugh at this situation, when can you?

I saw somebody on Sky Sports say it would be so Spurs to get relegated – or finish close to it this season – and go on to win the Champions League. That made my heart skip a beat for a second, but then I had to remind myself about their ‘run’ to winning that thing:

• Woeful Man United last season in the final
• Bodo/Glimt in the semi-final
• Frankfurt in the quarters
• AZ Alkmaar in the round of 16

The Champions League will throw up tougher challenges, so hopefully they can get knocked out of that as soon as possible, and Thomas Frank remains in charge for the foreseeable future. Please.

The only downside – which also has an impact on the relegation situation – is that West Ham were denied a win against Man United; a Man United side who, I was reading yesterday, are quietly confident that they can make a late charge for the title. Yesterday I thought ‘stranger things have happened’ and they’re ONLY 12 points off us. It’s 11 now, but if we can beat Brentford tomorrow night, it moves to 1,4 and that should be that for any notion that they are a competitor. I’d prefer it to be City in their position and United to be in City’s position, but there you go.

There was some amusement for the Chelsea draw at home to Leeds, but with them 12 points off us, see Man United for where they are at and what their possible title charge could look like.

Tonight, our title challenge gets a little more squeaky bum as Fulham get dispatched at the Emptihad as they perennially do, but as I said yesterday and the day before, we just have to handle our business. That business will be Igor Thiago first and foremost, and whilst all season I’ve enjoyed his goals for Brentford as he’s in my FPL team, this match week I hope he is as quiet as a mouse.

That’s not how the fans are feeling, for obvious reasons, because Brentford are flying, sitting fifth in the form table guide – above us in seventh! They’ve won their last two games, which included two really impressive away wins at Newcastle and Villa. I saw some of the highlights from that game at St James’ Park and they probably could have had a penalty before Newcastle initially went ahead through some poor set-piece corner defending, but they should have been two-up before Brentford got their good first, and then their penalty, which looked a bit of a dodgy and fortunate one for me. So Newcastle created plenty of chances, and you’d hope that we can also do the same. The thing we will have to watch is Outtara. He is rapid, he’s a good finisher (as that game showed), and he is the kind of guy who works perfectly in a system where his team doesn’t have a lot of the ball and goes from back-to-front very quickly. There will be plenty of pondering over the next 24-36 hours as to who starts for Arsenal tomorrow, but with that in mind, I don’t think you can look beyond Jurrien Timber at right back. He’s the guy who is think is probably better suited to tackle somebody like Outtara.

Anyway, I mentioned their fans, so what are they saying? Here’s a few select quotes from one of their forums – Griffin Park Grapevine:

They are not going to know what’s hit them.

And:

I have a good feeling…

And:

Only Arsenal have more points than us in the last 10 games, we’re playing some of the best football we’ve ever played, we’re at home and the team spirit is unbelievable. KA is proving he can mix it up with unexpected changes so let LegoHead worry about how they can contain us.

There are other comments in there that, dare I say it, are pretty level-headed and respectful about us. I have seen none of that from Wolves, Forest, Leeds, Aston Villa threads, but the Brentford fans in the thread I watched talked about our squad depth and how we will certainly field a strong team tomorrow night. That goes without saying, but it’s interesting to see them acting pretty normal and not just chucking insults our way like most of these threads do from other teams. I’ve always liked Brenrford. Just not tomorrow night.

Bit of bonus reading that I did beforehand on the official site – nice interview with Eze talking about his first six months at the club. It’s a nice read, but a common thread for a new player, much like we heard from Rice. He talks about the level of information he’s had to take in compared to the rest of his career; he is working under a manager who demands a lot and drills so much tactical insight into his team, that we see on the pitch how versatile this Arsenal side is. I think a few of us have voiced very minor concerns about his lack of game time of late, but if you take it in the context of a player who is having to learn and adapt to a completely new way of training, playing, taking on info and instructions, perhaps it makes more sense. Arsenal and Arteta are also in a position where they have a deep squad and many players who have been in that environment for some time, so to have the luxury of being able to give a player like Eze points in the season in which he can take a beat, might be better for his long-term adaptation to The Arsenal way.

I do think he’s got a massive part to play in the latter part of this season. Not least because last season he came alive in the run-in, but also when you look at where he seems to come alive, it is in big games. He scored for Palace in the FA Cup Final and Community Shield. He’s scored a hat-trick for us against the Scum – he’s a player who relishes the limelight I think and every game is going to start getting massive if you think about how we’re now at what is known as the slightly cliched ‘business end of the season’.

I back him to get more minutes, as well as more important moments, for us still to come this season.

Back tomorrow after both press conferences have been done and we can start to think about how we might line up.

Or does it? I’ve seen times at which we’ve had an extended period in between matches because we’ve been knocked out of the FA Cup earlish like they were to Villa, but then you lose a bit of the rhythm and cadence of regular football.

I think for us it’s probably better that we’re playing later in the week. I mean, the whole ‘City could be just three points off Arsenal by the time they kick off’ adds a little bit of a psychological edge to proceedings, but given the narrative and way in which Arteta has addressed the talk of the title race up until this point, I think those Arsenal players will also be set up with the right conditions to block out a lot of the noise. The media manifesting this as if it is neck-and-neck is one thing, but those players need to be looking at the cold, hard facts and see where they have come and where they are at.

As fans, we have the licence to fret – of which we do – but those players are professionals, and they need to just cut it all out. I have to admit that I thought they were being burdened by the weight of expectation and worry after that United game, but since then, the focus appears to have returned. Of course, that means nothing if you slip up at these stages, but I have hope that this Arsenal team will do what the manager says and go into these games with a view to ‘enjoying it’.

If that is the case, then I think a tough and physical game against Brentford should be something they relish, because we know that Brentford are going to give us a run for our money on Thursday. We talked a bit about them at the end of the Same Old Arsenal pod we recorded last night, and I reeled off a few stats to try to work out what’s ahead of us for Brentford. Interestingly, they are the most efficient in front of the goal of any team in the league when you compare the number of shots they have compared to the number of goals they’ve scored. They don’t take many chances, but when they do, they have been scoring them, and we know that they are a good set-piece side. They are a clever side; they know just as well as we that the percentages when you get the ball into certain positions with corners, free-kicks, and throw-ins (of which they have a guy who has a bullet throw, as we know), then your probability of unsettling defences increases massively.

They also make some of the fewest final-third passes in the league, in the bottom half, and only Wolves, Leeds and West Ham make fewer. So this side goes back to front quickly; they are very efficient when they do, and they are very good with set pieces. I don’t know about you, but a pattern in how this game is potentially unfolding is really starting to become clear to me. They also make some of the most average blocks per game – this is a side who will be compact defensively, then look to spring traps with pacey wide-forwards and an in-form striker in Igor Thiago.

So what Arsenal needs to do is control some of the controllables. Winning the first few big battles in our box will be key, but we need to acknowledge that when Brentford are in their defensive shape, we’ll have possession and territory and we’ll need to – at times – show levels of patience. And I need to remind myself as well that we’ve started scoring more goals, whilst also keeping shut-outs, so maybe the team will lean more into their own form, rather than looking at what City will be doing.

I’m saying all of this as if we’re playing tonight, maybe because of the staggered match week. The interest tonight would be more ‘funny’ than anything else, because it would be funny to see Chelsea, the Scum and Man United all lose. Then tomorrow, the hopes are pinned on Brighton doing something at Villa, but I hold nothing in terms of hopes for Fulham at City. I watched Sky Sports last night, and the stats are shocking. Fulham have lost all of their last 19 games to City in all competitions. That includes 16 in a row in the Premier League and Marcos Silva for all the clubs he’s been in charge of in England? Zero wins from the last 13. They aren’t even picking up a point tomorrow night, so let’s forget about that and focus on the fact that The Arsenal need to do what they need to do on Thursday.

I might take some time tomorrow to start looking at how the Brentford fans are feeling ahead of this one, as well as what some of the other pundits are saying about how this one will unfold. But until then, I shall bid you a fine Tuesday and catch you all tomorrow for some more ramblings. Speak then.

We knocked him and his Palace side out already – why should City get a rule change? We’re all aware of the concept of being cup-tied, so why is it that now this rule shouldn’t apply? You knew the rules when you signed the player. We had it last season with Neto who couldn’t play the cup games. I remember when we signed Aubameyang and he couldn’t play in European competition. If you sign people midway through the season, they get cup-tied. It’s a ‘thing’.

Anyway, let’s get back to talking about The Arsenal, shall we?

What I’ve got on my mind this Thursday morning, is how Arteta has been using Havertz, because I quite like what he’s doing. Against Leeds at times it felt as though Havertz was playing as another striker with Big Vik. He was taking up positions that were closer to the Swede and I do think it unlocked something in Gyokeres. It may just be that we caught Leeds at a good time, it may well be that playing away from home affords Arsenal more space, but to my untrained eyes the closer distances between our two attackers meant that Viktor was more involved. He didn’t cut an isolated figure in between two centre halves. He was able to exchange a few more passes and although he did have a one-on-one that was blocked that he should have done better with, we are at least seeing a few more of those start to happen (think how he also got one against Forest).

I think the team are starting to realise that they need to get the ball quicker to him and in a one or two-touch move – think how quickly we went from back-to-front in the Kairat game with Havertz’s pass to Big Vik. That’s what the team are starting to do more of, and if he gets one or two of those a game, he might only bag with 50% of those chances, but if he gets a couple each match and scores at least one, we’re laughing.

I think Eze can be that direct and quick passer to Gyokeres as much as Kai. I also think we saw it for the Forest game earlier in the season. But the one guy I think maybe doesn’t suit what we need to do with Big Vik is Martin Odegaard. I’m just going on the eye test here, but we have all seen enough of Odegaard to know the player he is. I really like him, I loved his progressive passing approach against Leeds when he came on, but in recent weeks we’ve seen more of the Odegaard that drops too deep and is recycling possession, without much incision. Remember the video at the start of the season where the skipper sent a message to Big Vik, congratulating him on signing and saying, “if there’s anything I can do, just let me know”? Big Vik’s response was simple: “I just need assists”. The assumption was that naturally those two would click and that it would be Odegaard doing those balls in behind, but I think I’ve seen more in recent weeks from Havertz and Eze than I have from Odegaard when it comes to feeding the big man up top.

That doesn’t mean it can’t change, mind, and hopefully it will. Because Odegaard is going to get minutes, and he’s going to play. He’s Arteta’s ‘guy’ on the pitch; he’s the captain, so he will play more often than not. So we need him to be delivering for the strikers. I love the way he leads our press, but it’s time to step up and lean into the ‘chance creator’ role now. I think that means less of collecting the ball from deep. He needs to have a closer distance between himself and the three forwards. When he’s at his best he’s drifting over to that right hand side with Saka, but perhaps he needs to drift a bit more into central positions too?

Hey, I’m no tactical expert, I’m no genuis with data, but I am just a fan who see’s things with his eyes and I just think there’s a little more that Odegaard needs to do to foster that relationship with Gyokeres – and I say this because I think we’re going to see more of Havertz ‘AND’ Gyokeres, rather than Havertz ‘OR’ Gyokeres up top.

It’ll be interesting to see what he says ahead of the Sunderland game, because that one represents another chance to see where he’s going with the striking options, given that we now have all three of our main guys who have recently been on the scoresheet. I mentioned yesterday that some tricky games are coming up, including a midweeker against Brentford and away at The Scum, but having all of your strikers recently score in different comps is very valuable from a confidence perspective. Let’s just hope that some of the connections I believe I’m starting to see with this side can be maintained between now and the end of the season.

Right, I’m going to leave it there. Tomorrow I’ll start to look at Sunderland and what they might do to potentially hurt us on Saturday. Apparently, they’re missing Xhaka, which is a bit of a shame given that it would be nice for him to return to the Emirates, but in terms of handing us a small advantage, it certainly has an impact to have him missing, so let’s see how they’re feeling in tomorrow’s musings.

Catch you all then.

As usual I did my habit of going to have a look at a few Forest fan forums to see how they’re feeling, which gave me a little bit of hope, because they aren’t exactly bullish ahead of this one. Some of the quotes I came across were:

Can’t look beyond a comprehensive loss where we barely touch the ball and they win by a 3+ margin

and

Hope I’m wrong but reckon we’re in for an absolute hammering. Arsenal to have 80+ % possession, we’ll barely get out of our half and will struggle to put 3 passes together

and

I will be stunned if we get anything out of this game. I’m expecting a 3 or 4 nil loss. The Win against West Ham hardly filled me with confidence but it was important.

Now, of course, you and I know that despite the 4-1 win at home to Villa, we don’t really do high-scoring games. In fact, if you ask any Arsenal fan, they’d probably tell you that, given we’ve put four past Villa, three past Bournemouth, four past Portsmouth, and three past Chelsea on Wednesday, we’re all a bit surprised we’ve suddenly come into form. That’s normally because teams sit in a low block, but none of the aforementioned sides did that. I suspect Forest will be more deep-lying and more defensively resolute than any of those teams we’ve managed to score three or more against recently. Their recent results don’t suggest that, but we all know Dyche loves a bit of low-block murder ball against us – like he did whilst in charge at Everton last season – so I am not expecting much of a game. Their form as well suggests they’ll be trying to stop the rot a bit; they’ve won three of their last nine games, losing six, with their three wins coming against a terrible West Ham, a terrible Wolves, and a terrible Scum team. Their defeats have been home and away to Everton, as well as Brighton, Fulham, City, and Villa. So it’s a real mixed bag.

They’re also a team that hasn’t exactly been pumping the goals in, with 21 scored this season, which is joint second-worst with (surprisingly) Sunderland. They’re a bit better on their xG in 13th position, which suggests that they just aren’t putting their chances away, which gives a little insight into why some of their fans are pessimistic about their ability to put goals away against us tomorrow.

What is interesting about Forest is that they are one of the top sides in the league for progressive passing, making more of those than any other team, other than us, Liverpool, Newcastle, and City. They’re also top of the table when it comes to tackles won in the attacking third, so that suggests to me that they might be a little more aggressive in the press than I would have expected. The other teams up there are Brighton, and we know how they like to press the ball high. Does that mean that we’ll be seeing a Sean Dyche side that tries to be aggressive in the press and leave space with bodies forward?

Maybe. But I do think we’ll still see that direct, long-ball, up to the target man, Chris Wood. Then, if the ball is lost, that’s when they’ll look to win second balls, try to win those tackles in the attacking third. If you’re bypassing the midfield, you aren’t winning tackles there, which I think explains a little of their approach. If you look at the total number of touches in the third, Forest are also up there, with only Liverpool, us, and Man City having more than they do.

When it comes to their potency in front of goal, they’re about mid-table on the volume of shots they have, as well as the percentage of shots on target they get, with the second most crosses into the box in the Premier League this season.

A pattern is starting to evolve here, right?

1. Direct football, find the target man
2. Win the 50-50s in the attacking third
3. Balls out wide when the ball is in Arsenal’s half, get it wide and look for crosses in to the box.

Gabriel and Saliba might well have a day of lots of headed defending, methinks.

The pundits are obviously going for us, but they are all more cautious about how tight the game will be, compared to the Forest fans, with Neville calling it a 1-0 on the Overlap, Merse giving us a 2-0, Chris Sutton going 1-0 and the Opta Analyst giving us a 66% chance of a win, with Forest down as 15% chance of winning. SO that all looks good, but as we know, this Premier League is more than unpredictable; it’s why it is the most watched, the best, and draws in the biggest audiences. I’ll do a bit more of a preview on what we need to do tomorrow, as well as team news, but this is a game in which Arsenal need to win and they need to be able to show that we can keep City at arms-length, because there’s no chance that a hapless Man United (until they play us in just over a week’s time, of course) will get anything from a game against City.

Right, I’m calling it for today. Got a day of work before my weekend can kick off, so I’m off to start it with a bit of the gym.

Be lucky people. I’ll be back tomorrow.

So why do I not feel completely sated this morning?

I think it’s probably the feeling that this tie could – and probably should – be practically over. We outshot them. We had more big chances. We won more duels. We had more corners. The only thing Chelsea had over Arsenal on the night was greater possession, but, as the eye test showed, that was a little more sterile for us. It felt like we gave Chelsea a bit of a lifeline with the goals we conceded to a Garnacho who I personally think is one of the most overrated players in the league. The goals he scored felt avoidable:

1. Garnacho at the back post, unmarked after Neto had been allowed to float the ball in from the other flank
2. A poorly contested corner that went through a sea of players as Garnacho semi-mis-hit his goal attempt.

This game felt like one that we should have taken a 3-1 lead back to the Emirates on, something I know Mikel Arteta also believed, based on his post-match comments. It felt like a game that – despite Chelsea getting a few chances throughout – was one that we were in control of. That feeling helps when you score early, and Ben White’s headed goal from one of the first corners of the game certainly did its bit to calm any initial lingering nerves I had. It was pretty shocking defending, though; if we’re going to say that we could – probably should – have done better on our conceded goals, I think Chelsea fans waking up this morning will be feeling a lot worse about the concession of their goals.

That applies to the second goal we scored as well. Sanchez won’t want to go back into the video room for this match this week, that’s for sure, because it was he who allowed the ball to slip through his palms for Big Vik to break his drought and put us two up on the night. And as I said on the ol’ socials, boy, did the Swede need that. He cut another solitary performance at first last night, and the stats guys who run the graphics on screen are never going to be his friend, with last night’s number on screen in that first half saying that he’d by far had the fewest touches of any player on the pitch.

It doesn’t matter if you score though

That’s what we’ve been saying for a while, so if I’m going to have choice words to say when he doesn’t score and looks forlorn like Liverpool this time last week, we have to hand out some flowers to the big guy when he does. Right place, right time, hopefully this helps his confidence.

And at that point, you’d expect Arsenal to shut up shop. We’ve been good for quite some time at closing down games, but Mikel Arteta will be a little disappointed in the concession of those two Garnacho goals. That’s happened a lot over the last six weeks or so. I think most of us Gooners have put it down to Big Gabi being out at the start, but he’s been back for a couple of weeks now. Yet, we’re still not keeping the back line completely water-tight, which is something I think Arteta will be looking at today and tomorrow when they do their analysis on this match ahead of Forest on Saturday.

From a tactical perspective, I really liked how high we pressured Chelsea in their half of the pitch. When Sanchez played the ball out from the back, it was never long, and Arsenal clearly knew this would happen, because there was always a guy in the midfield picking the ball up in their own half, which forced several high turnovers and presented a few opportunities. Rice, Odegaard and Zubi – all had their moments in which they did that, and you could tell it was clearly instructive. Arsenal had Chelsea’s number on the night, which is also why I guess I’m a wee bit frustrated, because it felt like we easily had the beating of them and were the better team on the night.

I definitely felt that when Zubi scored. What a player he is, eh? He does the six role to perfection, but he’s also been given the licence to go forward more than he ever did at Real Sociedad, which is resulting in goals for him too. He has four goals in all competitions this season already. Last season, he scored two. In fact, across his career, he has only ever managed a maximum of four in a season – he has only scored 10 goals in 236 games across seven seasons previously, so he’s already matched his best, and we’re only just halfway through the season. This is a guy who has very quickly become an integral cog in this Arteta machine, and you can see why Arsenal pursued him through such a long campaign as they did last year. He is a superstar, and I love that he plays in our red and white. I’ll also take this moment to say ‘props’ to the team themselves, who worked the ball really well for that goal, including Big Vik, who gets himself an assist on the night too.

The job isn’t done, as Arteta was pointing out afterwards, but we have ourselves a one-goal lead to take to our own gaff in a couple of weeks’ time, and that is good. Whether it will mean that players are rotated, I doubt, because that is quite a slender lead for you to be doing mass tinkering as we did against Pompey. But there is at least the breathing space, and Arteta was at least able to make a few subs last night too, bringing on Merino,Jesus and Havertz for Rice, Gyokeres and Odegaard. Martinelli got on too to keep his engine running as well and perhaps the subs made us a little less organised as those players came up to speed with the game, but I do just wonder if we just switched off a bit with their second goal.

Hey, I’m nit-picking though because let’s be honest, we’re in a good position, we scored three goals and should now be heavy favourites to go one better than last season. And you have to take that. All eyes now shift to Forest away on Saturday, which will be a really tricky game against a Sean Dyche who loves to spoil the mood, so let’s hope those players have those game-faces back on immediately, because we can’t afford any Premier League slip-ups, having had a bit of a hiatus from it over the last week.

Back tomorrow as we build up to that one.

• The Scum lost to a last-gasp winner (and the manager tries everything, including being given an Arsenal cup and told to drink from it because they’ve ’bottled’ some of Mikel Arteta’s tactical ju-ju in there
• Man United can’t hold off Burnley
• Chelsea lost a West London Derby
• Villa held by Palace
• City surprisingly held by Brighton

And that last one really was a surprise, because I never thought for a second Brighton would get anything. I didn’t watch the first half, but caught a big chunk of the second, I have to say, City looked so open and ragged. I’d heard people say that a couple of times this season, but this is the first time I saw it on full display. And it reminded me of us nin 2007/8 after the Eduardo leg break. After that, 2-2 against Birmingham is where we lost the title that year, as we drew to Villa, Middlesbrough, then Wigan, and those additional dropped points basically ended our chances.

I don’t think City’s draw does that, because our dropped points back then were in March, not January. So there’s still lots of football to be played.

Including tonight.

And tonight’s one feels like the significance has just been ratcheted up, too. Liverpool comes to town, and there are so many narratives at play, I don’t really know if I’ll be able to do them all justice in one blog today.

There’s the revenge narrative, which I’m sure Arteta will be drawing on tonight. If he isn’t using phrases like “we owe them one” after the cagey game earlier in the season, then I’d be really surprised – we all saw the All or Nothing documentary, and we all saw how he used Ivan Toney’s “Nice kid around with the boys” tweet. Arteta will be using all he can to pump these boys up for this evening. The home crowd will do their part too; there’s a fan display, it’s under the lights, there will no doubt be some beverages drunk, and a raucous home crowd, further buoyed by last night’s results.

And those results last night segue nicely into the Incentive narrative, because City and Villa’s draws mean that Arsenal have an opportunity this evening to move eight points clear at the top. That’s a decent chunk of a gap with 17 games to go. It’s not big enough to really claim we’re getting close to it being done, because there is so much more football to play, but it would go a big way to giving this team the confidence and even more belief that, if they keep up this form and they continue to push and remain focused, then good things could await at the end. 

Which leads me nicely to the Champions narrative. Dominik Szobozlai has done an interview this week, and I think it got a few people’s backs up because of the headlines, but ultimately, all he does is state facts: Arsenal are not champions. We haven’t won anything. Liverpool are champions; they won it last year, so there’s an opportunity for Arsenal to make a statement against the reigning champions that they are ready to (hopefully) take over that mantle by winning tonight and sending a message to the rest of the Premier League.

That won’t be easy, though, as I talked about yesterday, because this is still Liverpool. They are still a very good team, with very good players, who still have the firepower to hurt us and have scored against us with alarming regularity over the last five to ten years or so. I think they will again tonight, and despite Slot trying to play the Arteta card with Ekitike, there’s absolutely no chance he doesn’t play tonight, I don’t think, or at least make the bench for impact in the second half. They need to show the world that last season’s Liverpool is still there. They need to show that their recent unbeaten run is sustainable and they need to prove a point, so what better way to do it than the team who are clear at the top right now.

What I am praying for is that this Arsenal team takes its opportunity tonight. Last season was characterized by Arsenal not capitalising almost every time Liverpool dropped points. What we’ve seen over the Christmas period is that Arsenal – this season so far at least – have – taken advantage when our rivals have dropped points. We need to do the same tonight, and I think for all of us – fans especially – we’re all waiting for those mega ‘statements’ that make us all believe this could potentially be our year. Beating the current champions, at home, to go eight points clear, is a perfect way of doing that. A draw just ‘saves par’ this evening, but can you, as Arsenal players, go one better at such an important and busy time in the season?

I really hope so.

From a team news perspective, given that we have had five days since our last match, I think Arteta won’t make too many changes from the Bournemouth game last weekend. I think Saka and Trossard will come back in, but suspect the rest of the team picks itself. And that means a super strong bench to call upon, which I really do think will need to be used tonight. A Liverpool fan commented on the blog yesterday that they think this could be a battering, but I can’t see that for two reasons:

1. Liverpool will be defensively resolute to make sure that doesn’t happen – even if it means sacrificing some of their attacking impetus
2. Arsenal is not a high-scoring team

On that second point, you can of course point to seven goals in our last two Premier League games, but I think when you look at us over the course of the whole season, there’s a reason why the bookies give shorter odds for Arsenal games with under 2.5 goals – our matches are usually low-scoring affairs.

So I think this will be tight, it will be cagey, we will concede chances and probably a goal, but the big question is whether we can take advantages of any lapses by the Lverpool team. Which to me means our wide forwards, once again, need to be on it. Saka and Trossard are doing the business, and then perhaps a job-swap for fresh legs to keep the Liverpool fullbacks on their toes. And then it’s probably about dominating the midfield. Those Liverpool fans haven’t been impressed with their midfield this season, whereas ours looks like it is starting to purr. We need to show that tonight and, if we do, then I think we’ve got a great chance of taking all three points.

I’ll be there tonight, in the cold, wind, and rain, hoping that by the end we all have nice feelings to take us into the weekend.

Catch you all tomorrow for a debrief.

Firstly, a lot has been made of their overperformance of their xG. And for sure, they absolutely have when you look at games like the one this weekend that they just played against Chelsea. The Blues had 2.1xG according to Fbref, whereas Villa scored two goals from their 1.2 xG. But if you look at the actual shots on target, it points to a wasteful Chelsea who only got three of their 14 shots on target, versus Villa’s eight on target from 11 shots.

Villa are clearly a prolific team.

So I started to have a little look at how they perform, numbers-wise, and blimey they are not one for the data nerds.

In terms of xG in the league this season, they are 15th. For xG allowed, they are 14th. For goals scored, they are sixth. For goals against, they are fourth. For progressive carrying of the ball they are 14th and for progressive passing of the ball they are 10th.

They are just a weird side to try and work out.

They have the second-highest save percentage of shots they face, which points to their annoying but obviously quality keeper, they have in Martinez, and are roughly mid-table when it comes to the total number of shots they have faced.

In terms of attacking threat, they have taken the 12th most shots in the Premier League, but they’re sixth in the league for total number of shots on target. But I think herein lies the secret to their success this season: Villa have the highest shots on target percentage of any team in the league.

This is an Aston Villa side that takes quality shots. They are not a high-volume shooting machine; they simply take shots and take them from decent distances too, which explains their low xG compared to their position, I think. If you’re taking pot shots and getting them on target from 30 yards, there ain’t a lot of xG you’re hoovering up.

They also sit in the lower half of the table for total number of passes completed, which tells me they want to get the ball from back to front as quickly as is humanly possible to create chances. That’s what we’re going to have to contend with tomorrow night:

• Quick transitional counters from back to front
• Shots from distance
• Probable sh*thousery and time-wasting from Martinez

Perhaps that shouldn’t really surprise us though. Last season at home we were two-up on 60 minutes having got one in the second and one on 55 minutes one what was a game we were in total control of, before Villa hit back with two relatively quick goals from a counter on 60 and 68 minutes. The season before that we lost 2-0 at home in one of the games that cost us the title; again that was with two counter-attacking goals in the last 10 minutes of the game. Villa have played rope-a-dope on us for two season’s now; it is time we learned from it and dealt with what they will be coming to us with.

A lot of that will depend on the team news too, which we’ll get from Arteta and the defensively solidity with the return of Big Gabi will be massive for us. Who plays at full back will also be important and I’ve got everything crossed that Calafiori and Timber are back. Who knows, maybe even a cheeky “Ben White is training too” wouldn’t go amiss.

Other than that there isn’t really a lot going on at the moment. I was toying with the idea on what some of the Villa forums might be saying, but I suspect it will be full of some of their fans doing a fair bit of crowing and expectation of victory after their really good run they’re on at the moment, so I’m not sure I can be arsed with looking at a few pages of comments.

Instead, I’ll simply take my leave for today and be back to you tomorrow when we’re got a bit more team news and an idea of how we might line up.

See you then.

Admittedly they were pretty terrible against a rejuvenated Leeds United side last weekend and some of the defending was pretty budget, I have to say, but I think that was the exception rather than the norm and I think we’ll get a better performance from Palace in the cup tonight.

I do think they will rotate though. They don’t have the biggest squad in the world and they’ve tended not to rotate too much where possible in the league, but the Europa Conference League and the earlier rounds of this competition has seen Glasner shuffle his deck a little and I think the same happens tonight. And we’ve got a data point to suggest that too, because in the fourth round Palace went to Anfield and heavily rotated a team with Benitez in goal (literally never heard of him until just now), Cardines (same), Canvot (again), Sosa and Uche all coming in alongside more familiar faces of Guehi, Lacroix and Kamada. So I do think we’ll see a few more of those unfamiliar names and whilst that represents a good opportunity for us, you only have to look at the fact they smashed Liverpool on their own turf to serve as a warning if we aren’t ready.

That’s been Arteta’s job yesterday and I think he will have been stressing to those players who will play tonight, that there is an opportunity to impress this evening, because I do believe he’ll take a few players out. There are some in which it is easy I think – Gabriel Jesus, Noni Madueke, Kepa – but because of our injury problems, I do think it is difficult to see how rotated he goes for it tonight. I still think there will be one or two of the familiar names to the team. And with that in my mind, my guess at a starting XI would be:

Kepa

Timber   –   Saliba   –   Hincapie   –   MLS

Norgaard

Nwaneri   –   Eze

Madueke   –   Jesus   –   Martinelli

He could play Norgaard at centre half, then maybe have that three-man midfield with Merino dropping in to the base, but I just don’t think he will and this side enables Arsenal to have a strong defensive line up, whilst rotating in some of those forward players to give them minutes. I don’t think we need to see Zubi, Rice, Saka or Trossard and I suspect we’re now at the point in which Jesus needs to start and get 60 minutes under his belt to see how his body reacts. Perhaps there’s then an opportunity to get Big Vik on for the last part of the game, or if Merino hasn’t started, he could come on up top. But I do think we need to get minutes in to legs and this team allows that. It also pairs up Martinelli and Jesus who, when Gabby J signed for us, struck up an impressive rapport in their first season playing together.

I also think you simply have to give minutes to Ethan and Myles and so I think they surely have to be a shoe-in tonight. Then, with them comes Eze against his former club and given he hasn’t started in the last game away to Everton, you probably give him the start tonight and then have Odegaard back in for Brighton on 27th. Then, behind them, Norgaard is the one I’ve chosen to anchor the midfield and my hope here is that Arteta isn’t tempted to play him at the back and then have Zubi or Rice coming in. Given he’s already spoken about managing Zubi’s minutes, it would seem mad to get him in for this game. That’s the same with Rice too; he is so important to us that if you can give him rest by having him sit this one out, then you have to do it.

What I am hoping for this evening is to see some of those players who haven’t started really make a case for themselves. Martinelli has bagged a few goals from the bench so I’m not looking specifically at him, but Noni has impressed without delivering end product domestically so far, so I’d like a big game for him. Then, of course, you’re looking at Gabby Jesus getting on the scoresheet to show that he’s back and to have people asking genuine competition questions with Gyokeres being patchy with his form. Behind them, Eze and Nwaneri probably do have a bit to prove and so I hope we get some twinkle from their toes today. At a period in the season in which the games come thick and fast, job-sharing of minutes is crucial and we need to know that these guys can come in and deliver continuity when called upon. They are all good enough, but it is night’s like tonight that you maybe just need to remind the manager that a little.

Palace will look different tonight in personnel, but their principles will remain the same; they’ll go with a back three, they’ll look to use their wing backs to create their with and get in to spaces as we try to press them high. So if they have wing backs who perform well tonight, that might be where our danger comes from. What we have to do is ensure that if we’re going to go one-v-one with wing backs and our full backs, then we need to win those battles that happen on the flanks. If Myles and whoever starts at right back (that’s why I didn’t suggest Marley Salmon to start there tonight, because I think positionally it will be seen as an area that Palace might be the most threatening) din their duels, then I think it will go a long way to us winning and progressing to that semi final that awaits in January to Chelsea.

It’s a competition that is low on the pecking order, but with the depth we have in this team it is a great opportunity to get some rotational players some minutes, whilst also making yourselves within spitting distance of a Wembley Cuyp final if you win. So let’s hope the boys go out there, do the business, but most importantly, nobody picks up any injuries.

I’ll be there tonight, then back tomorrow morning for a Christmas Eve debrief. See you then.

One the one hand, we have had a full week of training for the players, there are plenty of training pics that show key players are back in the squad and fit for tonight, plus we got an update from Mikel that Big Gabby is ‘pushing hard’ to be fit soon in his pre match press conference. We also have the fact that Everton will be without key players Ndiaye, Gana Gueye missing due to AFCON, as well as injuries to Branthwaite, Dewsbury-Hall, Coleman and Rohl are all out for them too. So there are a few signs there of positivity we could take into this game.

But…man…it’s Everton, you know? It’s the North West. It’s a team who we’ve only won once in seven up there. It’s a side with Jack Grealish fit and I feel like he’s always had good games against us. Plus, there seems to be so much that is pointing towards an Arsenal win, that it feels like the Football Gods will invariably look to scupper our plans somewhat. It just ‘feels’ like that, you know?

That’s the glass-half-empty part of me kicking in. Because the reality should be that this is a rejuvenated Arsenal side, an Arsenal side who have been able to work out some of those bad habits Arteta mentioned in his post-Wolves conference, a side who are top of the league until at least 5pm when West Ham inevitably get beat up by City at the soulless CityBowl for this afternoon’s 3pm kick off.

Arteta did get asked about the ‘habits’ in his press conference and he said that’s what they have been working on this week and that he hopes we’ll see an improvement. I think it simply has to be and the players know that too, so I think they’ll have some extra motivation tonight, which is what we need given the context of what is 100% going to happen in Manchester earlier in the day. We have options too; from what it sounded like in the press conference we are missing Big Gabby, Christian Mosquera, Ben White and Kai Havertz from the team, which feels like the bench should certainly be stocked with options if he needs it and that is a positive. And with that in mind, what sort of starting XI will we see today?

I have a feeling it’ll look like this:

Raya

Timber   –   Saliba   –   Hincapie   –   Calafiori

Zubimendi

Odegaard   –   Rice

Saka   –   Gyokeres   –   Trossard

I think the back four picks itself at this stage and given Hincapie has impressed, I don’t expect there will be too much shuffling going on by moving Calafiroi (back from suspension) into the middle and playing MLS. Despite having his workload managed in training this week, I think Zubi starts and when asked about it Arteta didn’t seem too fussed. Then, either side of him and just in front I think Arteta reverts back to what is his first choice midfield in Odegaard and Rice. Out of possession Rice slots in to a double pivot with Zubi, whereas in possession he is more furthr advanced occupying that space nearish to Trossard and trying to win the ball back higher up the pitch in that space just in front of the opposition D. Saka and Odegaard resume their normal partnership and I think Gyokeres and Trossard will be detailed to forge one. A few Arsenal fans have already noted that Gyokeres looked marginally better with Gyokeres on the pitch than Martinelli, but Trossard’s form is such that I don’t think you can keep him out and given that he’s had a week in training now, I don’t see how you can start anyone else. There was a question over whether Merino could be used in attack but I think Arteta will look at this game, look at the fact we’re away and there might be a bit more space than there was last weekend, then opt for the Swede over the Spaniard up top.

If he does go with that XI, the good news is that we have loads of options on the bench. We can name nine subs on the bench in the Premier League and if I roll off the names who are now fit, it looks like a strong bench to choose from if we need it:

1. Kepa
2. Lewis-Skelly
3. Norgaard
4. Nwaneri
5. Merino
6. Eze
7. Jesus
8. Martinelli
9. Madueke

You give me that bench and I’m saying “yep, there are definite options there to freshen up in the second half” and if it isn’t working, that’s what I want to see sooner rather than later today.

Hopefully it is working though. And hopefully we can get the first goal. It feels like that might be a telling sign between these two teams. We’ve conceded first in each of our last three away games and are yet to muster a win, whereas Everton have apparently lost eight of their last ten Premier League games in which they’ve been the first to concede, so it feels like that first goal might be telling in this encounter. The ending of the game needs to also not be as scary and frustrating as t’s been in our last three matches. Sunderland scored late, Villa scored late, Wolves scored late – albeit with us making an almost instant response. But those late goals are not great and if you’re doing that on a consistent basis, then there might be fair calls for some mentality questioning going on. My hope is that bad luck comes in threes and we’ve just had three of our last four in which we’ve had those 90-minute+ goals against us scored. So no more of that, please, Arsenal.

What I think we also need to see is more end product from our attacking line. The fact we are coming up to the halfway point in the season and we have our top scorers on just four goals isn’t really good enough. Yes, we have four of them – Saka, Gyokeres, Eze and Leo – but really we need to be bagging more in games and the fact that so many are predicting we win this as a one-nil or two-one tells you all you need to know about our challenges that remain in front of goal this season.

In Everton we come up against a side on 18 goals scored, which is joint fourth worst in the league, with 19 goals conceded – sitting them in a decent position in seventh, so you know that they will be difficult to breakdown, will remain resolute and I suspect given their injuries, Moyes might go for a a compact game in which a draw is a fine result. Yes they’re at home and yes, the crowd will be gee’d up given it’s the last game before Christmas and an evening kick off, but I don’t see Everton being expansive and having a go with a high press. They are a side that has six clean sheets all season and so they are well-versed in shutouts and when they have the ball in Pickford’s hands or feet, they’re going long (he launches the third most of any ‘keeper and his in-play passes have the second-highest average distance of any team in the league.

I think, having looked at some numbers on their defensive actions and seen they have the most number of blocks in the league this season so far, we’re going to get quite a difficult game to watch, if I’m honest. That’s why Leo and Saka and their tricky feet might be important today. And please, Martin Odegaard, none of those silly sand wedged lobbed passes; you seem to try them every game and they never come off.

It’s going to be tough, it’s going to probably be stodgy, but Arsenal need to find a way to get the first goal and I really hope that doesn’t mean we have another game where we essentially give up the first half to walking pace football. Given the week off for the players, there can be little excuse for ‘rest defence’ and so I want to see us moving the ball a lot quicker than we have all season.

Fingers crossed boys and girls. Because it really feels like we need this win to kick-start the Christmas period.

Catch you all tomorrow for a debrief.

I have to admit, I was kind of sad that I didn’t watch the batshit-mental football match last night that was Man United 4 – 4 Bournemouth. Looks like a Christmas hum-dinger of a game and one in which I saw Jamie Carragher describe it as “the best of the season”.

Of course it was. It had lots of goals, one team winning, then the other team, then the other team again before settling on a draw. For the neutral (no such thing) it was a barnstormer and for Sky it’s exactly what they want from a football match to advertise “The Barclays”.

But for both Bournemouth and United fans I bet it was a bit of a nightmare. Both teams will leave that game feeling like they should have won and both of those teams will probably come away with an unsatisfied feeling in their mouths and minds.

And I thought about our 4-4 against The Scum and I tried to put myself back in that position when it happened to us and how I felt. And it was even maddening now thinking about it. There are other matches, like the 4-4 at Newcastle, but that had the whiff of dodgy refereeing in it. There was the 4-4 at Anfield in which Arshavin but I feel like by then both teams weren’t really in the running for anything so it didn’t have the jeopardy about it. So it’s that 4-4 against Them that sprang to mind.

Now I fast forward to today and to how Arsenal really haven’t been a team who the likes of Sky Sports and TNT Sport want to hang their ‘great advert for the Premier League’ Schtick on, because other than the last few weeks, we aren’t exactly a team who are playing basketball matches are we? Last weekend had late drama, but that was because Arsenal were complacent for one moment. Villa Park had great drama and was described a ‘great match’, but that’s because it was a bit of an anomaly; Arsenal don’t usually play the way the opponent wants and Villa always want that type of game, where it’s a little end-to-end. It’s why they’re on this great run; nobody is actually low-blocking Villa from what I’m seeing. Wolves didn’t when they played them. We didn’t. West Ham didn’t. So you get those games. I think as well to an extent, it is the same with City, because Palace had a go at them last weekend, Fulham did in the 5-4, plus Leeds nearly snatched a draw too.

That’s what happened to us in our first season we competed for the title in 2023/24. Teams came at us because they saw a side who had two years prior been still a work in progress. Now they see a side who doesn’t let up too much, but also one that if you low block, there is an outside chance that you might be able to frustrate a draw, or score with your one chance you get. So the evolution of this Arsenal team is to take that ‘next step’ and to really push down the metaphorical boot on the neck of opponents.

I think that has to be in finding a way to score more first half goals. We’ve got 30 in the Premier League this season, with 13 of those coming in the first half. Not bad, nearly half, but City have scored eight more than us and six of those eight have come in the first half. When you score first, especially against so-called weaker opponents, it stands to reason that you are more than likely to go on to win the game (this blog is a few years old but goes into a little more detail and I still think is relevant). But Arsenal are such a good defensive unit (albeit we’ve seen some cracks appearing recently, I think we can all admit) that when we score first, the game more often than not feels like it’s almost there in terms of being won. If the psychological blow is dealt early, then it totally changes the complexion of the match. This season we have scored first in nearly half of our matches (seven). Conversely, Man City have scored in 12 of their 16 matches so far. That means the game opens up, they have an opponent who has to come out, so they get more chances to rack up more goals. This is what Arteta needs to unlock.

I’m a simple football fan. I’m not one of your in-depth deep analytical fans who can pour over hours and hours of data and come up with some hyper-intelligent answer. If you want that, check out the amazing Billy Carpenter on Substack – he’s great. I like to dabble and have a bit of a look on FBref to see if some numbers give me a bit of a story, but it’s only top line. But to my simple eyes and with my simple feelings, I do feel like the only way Arsenal unlock this league and win it the way I’d like us to win it – like Liverpool did last season – is if we find a way to unlock games. The simple eye test that I have and some of those around me in Block Five that I go to the games with, tells me/us that we start games too slow, too methodical in our build up. There’s too often that we shadow-box out opponents. It’s almost as if Arteta sometimes says “just suss the other guys out there for 15 minutes so I can see how they are set up tactically, then we’ll tweak it accordingly to see if we can win the game”. I know that’s clearly not what Arteta is telling them, but again, it’s just the way it feels as a fan when you’re in the stands watching it play out with the raw emotion and nerves of needing to win the game. It feels to me that there is an inherent caution in this Arsenal team in first halves of matches and if there’s something I’d like to see a little more, it’s that we perhaps push the boundaries of that caution a little bit more.

It won’t happen, I don’t think, because I think we would see a few more instances like that moment in the first half on Saturday when Hwang was suddenly through on goal because we had every player bar-Raya on the edge of their box. I will bet anyone hard cash (not that we’d ever truly find out) that Arteta has re-watched that moment about 50 times and will be replaying it to his team this week in training for sure. There will be a “if you feckers EVER do anything like that again, Imma whip yo’ asses so hard…” talking to at London Colney this way for sure.

The positive I did take from reading this Telegraph article yesterday was that it appears the players are self-serving now when it comes to critical analysis. Arteta will be mad, but he’ll also be internally pleased that the players know when the standards haven’t been met and reading this gave me comfort that they will all be doubling down their efforts this week to ensure there isn’t a repeat of the Wolves situation.

But that doesn’t quite put what I believe is the final puzzle piece in place to take Arsenal to the level where even City are shrugging their shoulders in disbelief that they can catch us. We had it about six weeks ago without the volume of injuries and the clean sheets were being racked up. But that was never sustainable. So I do think we need to find a way to unlock more first half goals. And that’s something I hope Arteta, the coaching staff and the analysts, are all working on trying to fix.

Right, that’ll be it for today I think, so have a good one and I’ll catch you all tomorrow.

I also think that we might see Saliba too because although the boss was all “I don’t know, we have another training session” yesterday, he admitted that he will be fine for Everton and so I reckon Saliba is ok for tonight. Whether or not they decide to be 100% on him remains to be seen because, with all due respect to Wolves, it is in attack that you would expect we will be spending most of our time. So even if they also want to rest up Timber (which will bugger up my FPL team but there you go) for this evening so he can be fine for Everton away next weekend, it remains to be seen. We do have Norgaard who played admirably as a centre half in midweek and I think the guys on the Arsenal Vision Pod made a really good point that Wolves and Club Brugge are probably of the same level in terms of opponent difficulty. So if Arteta is happy to play Norgaard in that game, he may well be happy to do the same again.

Personally, I suspect we might see a line up like this though:

Raya

White   –   Saliba   –   Hincapie   –   MLS

Zubimendi

Odegaard   –   Rice

Saka   –   Gyokeres   –   Eze

Here’s my thinking on the attacking side of it:

1. Odegaard is Arteta’s captain and when he is fit he plays
2. Saka got midweek rest and he’s another ‘first on the teamsheet’ kinda guy
3. Gyokeres needs more minutes and I think Arteta will want him in there tonight to get at least 70
4. Eze didn’t even get on the pitch and I think against what will invariably be a low block from Wolves, we have to have players who can dance their way around defenders.

On that last point, I suspect not getting on the pitch for Eze in midweek might also have a little something to do with his performance at Villa. He was ignominiously hooked at halftime for being asleep for the Cash goal and he had a bit of a stinker in Birmingham. If you let your foggin estandards drop then Arteta will let you know. So he saw zero minutes in the Champions League. But a home game against a team who will set up with a back five and holding midfielders and somebody like Martinelli just doesn’t really work. So I have a hunch it might be Eze asked to start from the left and drift in field to be involved centrally, as well as get shots off.

From Wolves’ perspective we got the good news that they will be missing Jean-Ricner Bellegarde through a hamstring injury. He’s been one of their best players this season and a key part of their midfield as an eight, so they will miss him, although Joao Gomes comes in from suspension, so he’ll slot back in to their midfield for sure. As I mentioned yesterday in the blog we know that Wolves will try to go long, they will try to get crosses in as their threat but we have to control everything tonight. Territory, possession, shots, the lot. This needs to be a game in which Arsenal have to show their quality. But there can’t be complacency. The longer it stays 0-0 the longer we’ll all get a bit antsy in the crowd of a smash and grab from the Black Country Boys – we’ve seen those over the years; one shot, one goal, but if Arsenal bag in the first half, the hope will be that the floodgates will open.

Wolves don’t usually park the bus, but I think they will today. I can’t see them sticking with their approach of trying to win tackles higher up the pitch and in some instances in the opposition half; if they try to do that they we will be able to cut through them so I think Rob Edwards will be pragmatic, he’ll stick his 11 men behind the ball and do a bit of “come on then – come and have a go” to us. Feels preordained that it will be the case today. So we need to find the answers, because if you want to win leagues then you have to find answers to every kind of opponent in every kind of way.

A lot of the pundits are obviously backing The Arsenal, but I’m with Lewis Jones from Sky Sports on this one. I don’t think this will be a battering – not in terms of the scoreline – because of the way Wolves might set up, but also because we always struggle to break down these types of teams. So I’d definitely plump for a 2-0 kind of score line. It’s the kind of score line you have seen us deliver already; we did it against Brentford, against Burnley, against West Ham, against Olympiajos, against Port Vale and against Athletic Bilbao. We get the first goal, we get the second goal, then that’s about it. And hey, I’d love that today because as bad as Wolves have been, they are still a Premier League outfit and they still have players on that pitch capable of causing an upset. Remember in 2020? They had themselves a victory during COVID and n February 2022 Hwang put them ahead on 10 minutes, only for us to come back in the last 10 minutes with goals from Pepe and an OG from Jose Sa. Hwang is still at Wolves and he’s still capable of magic, so we need to be mindful of that, because if we are complacent even Wolves can capitalise.

I’ll be there as usual and then tomorrow morning back on here for a debrief, as well as with Amanda and James for the Same Old Arsenal podcast. So until then, I’ll take my leave and wish you all the most happiest of Saturday’s, which of course can only happen if Arsenal win tonight.

Catch you tomorrow.

Wolves have picked up just two points this season, have scored eight goals in their 15 matches they’ve played, they’ve let in 33 and one look at one Wolves fans forum gives you and idea on what they think will happen – this prediction forum here has their fans saying it’ll be an Arsenal win with an aggregate score of 69 – 15 and an average rating of 5-0 Arsenal from 15 responses – not one thinking Wolves will win. They’re at the point where they are just happy when they score and that’s a bit sad really when the Gallow’s Humour kicks in.

You can see why – there aren’t many stats at all that are in favour of Wolves this season, albeit they aren’t comfortably the worst, so I don’t think we’re going to get the battering that many think we might dish out tomorrow. They’re in the bottom three for xG created and xG allowed, although they aren’t bottom of that one with West Ham and Burnley both delivering shockers in that regard. Weirdly too, they aren’t bottom of the shots on target faced either; Burnley take that crown with West Ham also ahead of them. Where they are rock bottom is their percentage of shots they save; which isn’t a stat a ‘keeper ever wants to see but it appears as though they don’t have a good time of it when teams get shots on target.

Their ‘keeper is a launcher of the ball from goal kicks and from a defensive point of view they top the league with the number of tackles they make in their own defensive third with 156 – no other Premier League team has to make as much. I read that stat and think that they might play in a low block, but weirdly, in terms of the average distance from their goal that Wolves make a defensive action (tackle, blocked shot, etc), it’s actually quite hjigh at 15 yards from their own goal. Arsenal are the highest with 18.6 because obviously opposition teams don’t get as close to our goal as much, so you’d think a low block team would have lower average distances (again, West Ham and Burnley are in the bottom two there), but Wolves are actually sixth in the league for average distance on defensive action. So, what does that mean? If I go amateur data nerd on you for a second (as I like to do), that tells me that Wolves are a team who play a higher line than you’d expect and that there might be some opportunities to get in behind tomorrow evening – I’d certainly hope so.

You’d also hope that defensively we’d be able to keep them quiet, because they have the lowest number of shots they’ve taken this season of any team, the lowest number of shots on target per 90 and the fifth highest distance that they’re taking their shots from at 17.4 yards. So this is a team that is struggling to penetrate opposition back lines up until this point and who don’t create many chances or shots at all. This will be a Wolves team that goes long as often as possible – they have the highest number of attempted long balls in the league – and this is a team who when the ball does go long it goes into the channels and they look to cross the ball in (they have the highest number of crosses into the penalty area of any team this season.

Arsenal will be aware of this, Arteta will be aware of this, they need to be ready for this and they need to be in the mindset of scoring early because if we do (and I’ll do more of a match preview tomorrow), then I think this game could run up a few goals.

But football is weird and even though there won’t be too many brave men betting on Wolves winning at The Emirates tomorrow night, I still feel like we need to be wary of any threat or potential banana-skin. You only need to look back a couple of weeks to see how Villa nearly came a-cropper; Wolves looked good, scored a good goal that was ruled out, forced Martinez into some great saves (including tipping one onto the bar) and Villa had to rely on a wonder strike from the edge of the box to seal the win. We know what good form Villa are in so for Wolves to give them the type of game they did, should serve as ample warning for Arteta and his coaching staff.

But if you want to win league titles then you have to win your home games like tomorrow, so Arsenal have a job to do and that’s what Arteta will be telling those players in training today.

More on how Arsenal will line up tomorrow, as well as any interesting titbits from the press conference today but for now, I hope you have a great Friday and I’ll be back tomorrow with more pre-match thoughts.