Morning all, hope you have a deliciously spooky Halloween. I was visited by a killer clown but thankfully offerings of chocolate eyeballs and jellies were enough to placate them and I escaped with my life. Phew!
Tonight it’s Champions League action and it’s pretty clear that Arsene Wenger has one eye on Sunday’s game against Sp*rs, as he’s not taking any risks. Santi Cazorla remains sidelined with his Achilles problem; Theo Walcott and Nacho Monreal – who have been dealing with minor niggles – are not being risked; while a ‘little incident’ late in yesterday’s training session means that Hector Bellerin has not made the trip. Hopefully it is just something small, and he’ll be ok for Sunday, but there were no more details than that.
So, you’d imagine Kieran Gibbs and Carl Jenkinson will play in the full back positions, and with midfield stronger there’s some scope to change things around there. Granit Xhaka is available, of course, while Aaron Ramsey is in contention although perhaps not from the start. Up front Olivier Giroud will be raring to go, speaking about how he can win back a place in the side:
We have a very good team cohesion and I’m not questioning myself too much. I’m just focused on the team. I just need to play and play more and, in training, show that I’m in good form. That’s what I tried to bring to the team when I came on against Sunderland.
I feel good on the pitch you know, my injury is now behind me and I want to work now. I want to focus on the next stage of the Champions League and another big game on Sunday. I’m just concentrating on what I have to do on the pitch and my time will come.
It’s hard to consider ‘resting’ Alexis, of course, but then you have to weigh up the ability to win tonight without him from the start with having a fully fresh Alexis to unleash on Sp*rs on Sunday. There may be some hints as to what he’s going to do against them by the team he picks tonight, but Arsene Wenger is still very focused on his team’s ability to do the job tonight. He’s aware of what’s coming, but says:
We need to continue to do what we’ve done until now by just focusing on the next game. We have to try to win tomorrow night and then we have Tottenham at home on Sunday. The best way to prepare for that is for us to continue our strong run. It’s important to keep a good balance between vigilance and confidence.
I think, perhaps, the 6-0 scoreline in the last game means people think this one will be a walkover. Even the manager himself admitted it was ‘flattering’, so we can’t take anything for granted. The hope is that if we do rest a couple, and are without a couple who might well have been important, the ones who take their places are determined to show what they can do, and make up that shortfall.
They did cause us some problems in the last game, but fingers crossed we can deal with whatever they have at home and get the goals we need for what would be an important win in this group.
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Arsene Wenger touched on November, a month that many dread because of years gone by, but he’s insisting what happened in the past has no bearing on this season. He said:
We’ve had in difficult Novembers in previous seasons, but we’ve also had positive ones in our history too. The most important thing is to not live with the past, we have to live with the team we have at the moment.
So, just for the record, I went back to look at the Novembers of recent years to see how bad/good they were. Starting with last year:
2015-16
Played: 5
Won: 1
Drawn: 2
Lost: 2
2014-15
Played: 6
Won: 3
Drawn: 1
Lost: 2
2013-14
Played: 6
Won: 5
Drawn: 0
Lost: 1
2012-13
Played: 7
Won: 2
Drawn: 4
Lost: 1
2011-12
Played: 6
Won: 3
Drawn: 2
Lost: 1
2010-11
Played: 8
Won: 4
Drawn: 0
Lost: 4
So, definitely some good, and some bad, and just looking at them the bad doesn’t seem as bad in terms of results as I had remembered. However, I think the impact of November in some seasons went beyond what we can see from the outcomes of games. Last season injuries to Alexis, Cazorla and Coquelin had a real knock-on effect as the season went on.
I suppose the other thing to consider is whether or not this is something that is even in the minds of the players. As fans we have a different outlook on things, we look for patterns and things that seem familiar – whether they’re good or bad. I suspect the players might not view a single calendar month as unlucky, because it really doesn’t make much sense for that to be true. No doubt they’re looking at the upcoming fixtures as challenging, but only because of the quality of the opposition, not what time of year the games are being played.
Extra reading this morning with Anam’s Tactics Column, looking at the win over Sunderland in the way we used our full backs. And to help you through the day, yesterday’s Arsecast Extra looks ahead tonight’s game, as well as covering all the weekend’s action, Aaron Ramsey’s accidental creativity, Arsenal nightmares and loads more. Have a listen below.
Download – iTunes – Acast – RSS
This Arsecast Extra was recorded with ipDTL.
We’ll have a live blog for you later on, so you can follow the game with us even if you’re stuck in work etc and can’t see it. News throughout the day on Arseblog News. Catch you later.
