Morning all, it’s an early start as I’m heading for Lisbon today.
We’re in Champions League action against Sporting, for what is sure to be a very tricky game. They might have parted ways with Ruben Amorim who has the job of rebuilding Manchester United, but they sit top of the Portuguese league right now, and he’s left very strong foundations for the new man – Joao Pereira – to work with.
They have a striker in Viktor Gyokeres whose name comes up all the time when any conversation about Arsenal bolstering the ranks takes place, and in 19 games this season he has 24 goals to his name. Some of that might be down to the relative strength of the competition he plays in most regularly, but he has 5 goals in 4 Champions League games, including two when Sporting hammered Man City 4-1 just a few weeks ago to leave them in second place in the table as it stands. I think it’s fair to assume that we’re going to be challenged by tonight’s opposition.
If there was some surprise at elements of our team selection for the win over Forest on Saturday, I wonder if this game was in the back of Mikel Arteta’s mind. He had the ability to fully rest Kai Havertz and Gabriel Martinelli after their international exploits, while there was no need to call on Declan Rice giving him (or his toe), another few days before being called into action. I would be quite surprised not to see all three of them start tonight, and if Rice does come back into the midfield, it will be interesting to see who doesn’t play.
Mikel Merino was quietly good against Forest, Jorginho had an excellent first half before wisely being taken off at the break because of his yellow card, while Thomas Partey’s excellent goal will give the manager some thinking to do. It could be Partey, Rice, Odegaard; it could be Rice, Merino, Odegaard. We’ll have to wait and see which combination Arteta feels is most suitable for this game.
Speaking at his press conference in Portugal last night, the manager was asked about our away form in Europe, and said:
It’s certainly something that we have to improve. I think we have made the right steps. Looking back at the way we played against Inter, and against a team that has been so dominant in the league and having the Champions League final that they should have won, and played and dominated the game like we should have done.
But the reality is that after you have to make it happen and we didn’t. Making those steps is what we have to do next. Be ruthless, be much more efficient in the opposition box and when we get there actually do what we have to do to take the three points away from here.
Having got back to winning ways on Saturday, it’d be good to keep that going, and start to build some real momentum. As I said though, this will be very challenging, but if we can put in a good performance, it might the kind of result that helps kick-start this period where there are games every three or four days.
I’m also just looking forward to see the lads in action. It’s been a while since I’ve done a European away, so fingers crossed it’s a good night on and off the pitch. Hopefully see some of you out there.
For now, I gotta get going and head for the airport. I’ll leave you in the capable hands of Andrew Allen and Lewis Ambrose for blog updates over the next couple of days, and we’ll do a post-game podcast on my return to Dublin on Thursday.
Have a good one!
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