Morning. Happy Friday to you all.
Mikel Arteta will be holding his pre-Newcastle press conference early this morning ahead of our trip to Newcastle tomorrow. It comes after a report from Simon Collings that Martin Odegaard could be available for our visit to Inter Milan on Wednesday, and is an outside chance to make the squad for this weekend.
That’s obviously quite promising. I’d be surprised to see him for Newcastle, if only because his ‘availability’ for three games might just make Norway feel he should be available for them. And with all due respect to our Norwegian readers, I don’t think that would be a very good idea. Anyway, let’s see what the manager says in a little while.
The other player I’m on slight tenterhooks about is Ben White after Arteta said we ‘lost’ him in the build-up to Preston on Wednesday. Hopefully he was just rested in midweek, not risked before three challenging away fixtures, but again we’ll wait for whatever crumbs of information Arteta provides.
Also from Simon, an interview with Gabriel Jesus, in which he talks about scoring his first goal since January:
When people say [it is my first goal] since January, it looks like it’s a long, long time. Obviously, it’s nine months and I understand. But also people need to understand that I am starting less, I am playing less.
Bottom line is, if he had been scoring, he’d have been playing more. As someone like Leandro Trossard has demonstrated more than once, if you deliver from the bench, you can play your way into the starting XI. But I don’t think Jesus is really making excuses here, he’s not lacking self-awareness, and continued:
I also understand that I am the type of player, with my quality, that has to be there and score more. I want to and I am working really hard to get there. Then when I have my opportunities to play my minutes, I try to help the team and also I think now I am more focused on goals.
Now I am more focused to shoot because before I didn’t shoot a lot. Now, I think what has changed for me is I try to look for the goal. It’s good to be back scoring and obviously I want to keep scoring when I have my chance.
As I said yesterday, his goal yesterday was the perfect chance for a player low on output and for whom that must have been a significant psychological burden. He didn’t have to think, he just had to hit it, and now some of that weight will be lifted off him. When forwards don’t score for that long, it really does become an issue, so hopefully we can see the benefits of that – and this week would be a very useful time for it.
Nevertheless, it’s hard not to fear that we might not ever see the Gabriel Jesus we enjoyed so much before his World Cup injury. A player who was so impressive and helped the team go up a level, but it’s two years since that incident, and I don’t think he’s ever been the same since. There have been other smaller injuries to contend with, which have disrupted his rhythm and form, and it’s not unprecedented to see a player suffer a major problem and never quite hit the same heights again.
It’s a shame, because despite his profligacy in terms of finishing, he offered so much to the team. It would genuinely be brilliant if he could find any of that form again this season, because the team would benefit so much, and with a lot of football to play before January (where I’m not necessarily convinced we’ll do any business anyway), we need as many of our forwards firing as possible.
So far Bukayo Saka and Kai Havertz have done most of the heavy lifting, with Gabriel Martinelli and Trossard just about hanging onto their coat-tails. But to win the points we need to maintain a title challenge and to be competitive in the cups, we’re going to need Jesus and Raheem Sterling to pitch in too, so let’s hope they can do that in the games and the weeks ahead.
Right, I’ll leave it there for now. We’ll bring you all the press conference stuff, team news updates etc, over on Arseblog News, and we’ll look ahead to Newcastle properly over on Patreon with our preview podcast this afternoon.
To keep you going in the meantime though, please find a special Arsecast interview with Arsenal legend Martin Keown, chatting about his life, career and his new book ‘On the Edge’. You can also win a signed copy too. Happy listening.
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