Tag Archives: FA Cup

Who is in line to start v Nottingham Forest

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Who is in line to start v Nottingham Forest

When Arsenal have been drawn with lower league opposition in the early stages of the FA Cup, Arsene Wenger has rotated his squad.

This policy has proved correct for Wenger, as he has never been  knocked out of the FA Cup at the 3rd round stage, and only ever once lost to a lower league side – the 5th round defeat to Blackburn Rovers in 2013.

I have spoken before about how Arsenal should prioritise the cups over the league in the second half of the season. That winning silverware is more important than finishing 4th.

That being said, Arsenal have a very busy January – from December 28th to February 3rd, we are due to play 11 times. That is just 36 days (I think). With FA Cup games, and the League Cup double header against Chelsea, we need to rotate the squad.

We play Nottingham Forest on the Sunday, then Chelsea in the League Cup semi-final on Wednesday, before visiting Bournemouth next Sunday.

Wenger will want his first team for the Bournemouth fixture. It will be interesting to see how he shuffles the squad for Nottingham Forest and Chelsea.

Will he play 2 separate sides? The first XI in one fixture, the 2nd XI in another? Or a mixed XI with key players split across the 2? Or will he play his second XI in both the Nottingham Forest and Chelsea games, giving his first team a 10 day rest before Bournemouth?

What is for certain is David Ospina will start in goal against Nottingham Forest. I imagine he will also play against Chelsea.

The make up of the team will be further confused by the formation.

In the last round of the League Cup, we went to 4 at the back with Rob Holding partnering Calum Chambers. We have recently returned to 3 at the back in the league.

With Laurent Koscielny likely to be rested as he continues to have his career managed due to a troublesome Achilles, we will certainly see Per Mertesacker return in the middle of the defence. I doubt Wenger will risk Shokdran Mustafi – who is still returning from his own injury issues.

Having played the last few games, I would not be too surprised if Chambers drops out with Rob Holding starting alongside Mertesacker. Partnering Holding and Mertesacker in a back 3 will either be Krystian Bielik or Julio Pleguezuelo.

My opinion is that whoever does not start between Holding / Chambers and Pleguezuelo / Bielik will be in line for a start against Chelsea (with Mustafi coming into the middle).

It will be interesting to see what Wenger decides at wing back.

Mathieu Debuchy will be in line to start ahead of Hector Bellerin on the right. On the left, Sead Kolašinac and Nacho Monreal are almost certainly out injured and, with Ainsley Maitland-Niles on first XI duties our options are limited. Utility youngster Josh Dasilva might get the nod, or Wenger might choose to go for someone like Chiori Johnson.

I do not expect Granit Xhaka or Jack Wilshere to start in the middle of the park. Wenger will surely go for the experience pairing of Francis Coquelin and Mohamed Elneny. Do not be too surprised to not see Wilshere until the Bournemouth game.

Another interesting talking point will be who plays behind the striker.

Mesut Ozil and Alexis Sanchez will both surely be rested. The worry is Wenger will go with Theo Walcott who does not suit playing narrow, behind a striker. But he does need match fitness, even if it is to prove he is ready for a transfer. Personally I would prefer to see Reiss Nelson get a wrong out.

Alex Iwobi was dropped for the game against Chelsea in the cup, he will surely come back in, playing behind Danny Welbeck.

All in all, it should be a strong XI filled with internationals. Beating Nottingham Forest should not be a problem.

Expected XI:

Ospina

Holding Mertesacker Pleguezuelo

Debuchy Coquelin Elneny DaSilva

Walcott Iwobi

Welbeck

Now I am off to Hooters

Keenos

What should Arsenal prioritise this season?

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P 18 W 17 D 1

At the time of writing, that was Manchester City’s results in the league so far this season. It is awesome form that is seeing them average 2.88 points per game. Keep it up and they will end up with a record breaking 109 points.

They have blown the rest of the Premier League away this season. A mixture of having a top coach in Pep Guardiola, and having a squad that cost £632m has seen them have the strongest set up in the Premier League since those early Jose Mourinho days at Chelsea.

If the first XI is not working, Guardiola has a bench which contains £100s of millions worth of talent, including the likes of Bernardo Silva who cost £43m.

When Sergio Aguero, has easily been the best striker in Premier League over the last 5 / 6 years is no longer guaranteed a start, it shows the strength of their squad.

It is not just the money they have spent, the football that Guardiola is coaching his players to produce puts them a cut above.

This brings me on to the main part of my thoughts.

Whilst it is frustrating that it is Manchester City and not Arsenal running away with it, the fact is,. For 2017/18 at least, Man city are going to win the league, Arsenal or not.

So what else then do Arsenal have to play for?

  • Top 4 finish
  • Finishing above Spurs
  • League Cup
  • Europa League
  • FA Cup

There are 5 motivations for the players. What is important now is that as we are not going to win the league, we re-organise our priorities this season.

Firstly, finishing above Spurs and a top 4 finish can be put into one box.

Personally I think that Manchester United and Chelsea will both be good (and consistent) enough to finish top 4. That leaves one more place for Burnley, Liverpool, Tottenham and Arsenal to battle over. Finish top 4 and we finish above Spurs.

Also, bar bragging rights, finishing above Spurs does not really mean much in the long course of history.

In the 1992/93 season, Arsenal finished 10th. Spurs finished 8th. Arsenal became the first ever club to do the domestic cup double. Spurs won nothing. I imagine if I asked the question (before I told you the answer) as to where Arsenal and Spurs finished in 1993, you would not have a clue. Bit if I asked who won the cups, you would know both.

This brings me on to the next point. If we are not going to win the league, should we be prioritising league games over cup competitions?

We got mocked for the Top 4 Trophy for 10 years. During that period, many Arsenal fans who have consistently called for Arsene Wenger’s head moaned that Wenger was prioritising a top 4 finish above winning cups. He was disrespecting cups.

Last year Spurs finished above us, they showed progression, they competed but ultimately they won nothing.

It seems now Arsenal fans have done a 360. Rather than win a trophy, suddenly that want the team to show progression and compete, to finish top 4.

The same people moaning that top 4 is not a trophy now what us to finish top 4, even if it means no trophy. They want us to prioritise the top 4.

My fear is, Wenger, and the board, will go the same.

They will go back to the old thinking that finishing top 4 is more important than winning a trophy. They will prioritise it, and continue to play a second XI in the cups. Ultimately this could leave us with no trophies and, on current form, outside the top 4.

Personally, I would actually like us to prioritise the trophies over the league.

Last season Manchester United won the League cup and Europa League. They made the decision to prioritise the cups over finishing top 4. Their hand was forced due to being about 10 points behind a top 4 position going into Christmas, but ultimately they won the trophies.

In years down the line, Manchester United will remember the trophies they won in the 2016/17 season, but will anyone remember who finished top 4? Probably not.

At the time of writing, there is just a single point between 4th and 7th, with Arsenal in 7th. But is there actually any difference between finishing 4th and finishing 7th, bar the Champions League football and finances it brings?

Now this would be controversial.

I would not be too unhappy if we played a B team in the league games that occur before a mid-week cup tie.

I would not care if we finished 10th, if it mean winning a cup.

Football is all about winning trophies. The winners are remembered. We entered 4 competitions at the beginning of the season. One we can no longer win, 3 we can. So why prioritise the completion we can no longer win?

Over the years, Sky and UEFA have brainwashed fans to believe that the only trophies that matter is the Premier League and Champions League. Sadly, some fans now believe this calling the FA Cup no longer the competition it once was.

Tell anyone who was at Wembley in May that finishing top 4 was more important, or those Manchester United fans in Sweden that finishing 6th means everything whilst winning a European trophy means nothing.

Now let’s play a game.

Below is a list of the seasons we won a cup. I have excluded the seasons where we also won the league. Name the trophy and Arsenal’s league position in the corresponding season:

How did you get on? I bet you were able to write down the majority of the trophies won quite quickly. But how about the league positions? I imagine the more recent ones were easy, but how many of the earlier ones did you guess?

Do you want the answers? They are at the end of the blog.

The point of the exercise was to highlight that history only remembers one league position. And that is first. But you will also remember the other successes. The other trophies won.

I could probably name every FA Cup winner between 1988 (I was 3) and now. I would struggle to name who finished 2nd in those season, let alone 4th.

It will require a change in mentality, but with us being 19 points behind Manchester City in the league, sacrificing the league position to potentially win 3 cups surely makes sense?

And finally, those answers:

Keenos

Are Arsenal actually in the middle of a glory period?

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In researching for responses to yesterdays blog on how things at Arsenal are actually not as bad as what they seem, I ended up asking myself a question:

Are Arsenal actually in the middle of a glory period?

Now before you spit your tea out all over your monitor, hear me out.

Arsenal have won 3 FA Cups in 4 years. That is 3 trophies, 3 bits of silverware. Now some of you will already be saying the FA Cup is not enough. Well done for being brainwashed by Sky and UEFA to think that the only thing that matters is the Premier League and the Champions League.

I remember the days of the 90s, when we won the domestic cup double and then the European Cup Winners Cup in 1994. I could not tell you where we finished those years.

3 trophies in 4 years is a success, especially when you factor in that Arsenal’s hit rate since 1900 is just under a trophy every 4 years (give or take a bit of time for the World Wars). Interestingly, prior to 1996, it was a trophy every 5 years. So 3 trophies in 4 years is clearly well above our going rate.

Now I looked into it further, to try and establish what our most successful periods in our history are, and how does the current period compare:

What is clearly missing from the current successful period is a league title, but what is clear is when you look at the bigger picture, that over the 125+ year history of the club, we are in one of most successful eras. Don’t believe me?

Despite our reported demise, only 4 previous era’s have shown a better years per trophy period than the era we are currently in.

The above 5 eras span 37 years between them. That means that outside of these eras, we have had nearly 90 years of either no success, or just the single trophy.

Whilst we might all be a little bit despondent about the current era, history will show it in a good light, that we are in one of the more glorious eras of our history.

Embrace the success.

Keenos