How many times have you watched those first 35 minutes v Spuddies again? I am currently at four and what a joy they bring. All goals sprang from deep, where we won the ball and then weaved and meandered our way to the Spuds’ goal. It was easy on the eye and at the same time devastating to our much loathed NLD opponents.
The question is can Arsenal do the same against Potter’s high flying Brighton, especially now that our conductor Granit is unavailable?
From our last post it became clear that most of us believe that Arteta’s best options are to either play Partey as a lone DM or to stick to the 4-2-3-1 formation and play Lokonga next to Big Tom.
Brighton are a well drilled and settled team and will come with their own plan, no doubt. They pass the ball round well and are strong at set pieces, and they have a couple of players who can add that little bit extra up front.
I think it would be good to let them come to us as we did with the Spuds and then take them on the break. Therefore, I prefer to play the Sambi-Partey combo in midfield today.
The defence (the Rocks) and attack (the Pirates) pick themselves, but I do hope to see half an hour of Pepe and Laca as well.
So my predicted and preferred lineup is:
Come on You Rip Roaring Gunners!!!
By TotalArsenal 🚀 ⚽ ⚽
Bergkampesque 
Not a bad starting line up made up of the usual suspects. It is in deep lying midfield and the forward area that we may expect to see interventions.
Will Pepe start and so, we have one of ESR or Saka rested for this? Is it possible Arteta feels he would rather have AMN instead of Lokonga to retain the shape we have come to be comfortable in (Partey to the right; AMN – for Xhaka- to the left)? Could Arteta rest Tierney and start Tavares? Or even Holding?
Man U played in Europe and have stat excuse/luxury to rotate. We don’t, but we all know Arteta may just surprise us with his starting 11.
VAR chalks off a potential winner for Everton, at Old Trafford. It looked a good goal at first glance but after all those “lines” drawn by VAR, Mina was offside by a toe or more.
Ends 1-1 at Old Trafford. I am sure only one person predicted a draw here. Well done, whoever that was. When I saw the injury list of the Everton side, I thought they will give it a go but lose narrowly. A draw is a Herculean effort by the toffees.
Pete, a bit late getting back to your response I know but here goes, re: Laca and Eddie sale if possible in January, it’s less a case of panic buying as panic selling, in that if the possibility to sell them for an acceptable amount in January arises, then I think we should take it especially given the scenario you allude to in the hoped for early return by Auba. Of course if we managed to sell both Eddie and Lacazette then loaning out Balogun is a non starter as we’d need him as cover alongside Martinelli.
Could we sign a striker in January of the required quality for the right price? I’m not too sure we could so that would seem to be a job for next summer.
Yeah, three midfielders should cut it for a month in January, or 6 weeks if anyone goes the distance.
Do our ANC players get a week off after the competition, maybe, maybe not?
Offside by a toe, I thought that didn’t count anymore, hold on, we’re talking about Man Utd here, the club beloved by Mike ‘biased’ Riley so that explains it. Still a 1-1 draw is good if we can take advantage?
Yes, that’s the line up for me Total, no need to overcomplicate things, let Brighton worry about us.
Ben White is certain to pass on a few ideas to Arteta about how Graham Potter approaches games and especially vs the Gunners. It should be a very tasty game.
Good questions, Eris. I think my lineup is 10/11 correct, but we’ll know very soon.
Good point about White informing on the Seagulls’ secrets, Kevski.
Looking forward to the game.
Thanks for the response, Kev.
There will be a lot of debate about it – and I admit I might be a bit biased as I’m too loyal to the academy players – but I’m not entirely sure that many available and affordable strikers would be quality upgrades compared to Nketiah. He is a strong, fast, hard-working guy with extreme statistics on the U18, U23 and England U21 levels. Maybe after his dream debut against Norwich City the expectations were too high. https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/41647092
Indeed, he didn’t have strong couple of years lately, but it is hard enough to be #3 behind Aubameyang and Lacazette, (especially in a single-striker formation), and Arteta is not famous about prioritizing rotation and even minutes over fielding a strong team in cup competitions, but we could see against Wimbledon (not just his goal, but that was the moment of the game, no doubt) that he is really very talented when it comes to offensive positioning. Holding the ball as the sole striker is not his strong suit, but I wouldn’t sell him, as he will surely become a clinical, prolific finisher in a couple of years.
I was about to bring the official line-up from LiveScore, but I save mayself the typing, as it is 11/11 from TA’s prediction above. Well done!
https://www.livescore.com/football/england/premier-league/brighton-%26-hove-albion-vs-arsenal/438703/?tab=Lineups
The only difference is that Lokonga plays on the left and Thomas on the right, but that is immaterial.
Subs: Leno, Soares, Holding, Tavares, Elneny, AMN, Pepe, Martinelli, Lacazette
I wouldn’t sell Eddie either Peter if he had signed a new deal, but he didn’t and that mate is the elephant in the room.
If Eddie had signed then Balogun would be out on loan now, I’m sure of that, but we can’t risk losing him for nothing in the summer can we? Can we?
Seems as if the Brighton injuries rumours were accurate.
The sensible lineup and I look forward to seeing Loko-Partey run the show.
By keeping it as close to last week as possible, the boss is looking to keep it going. Actually a great idea now that I think about it.
Smart
Committed defending and a few half chances. Need to increase the tempo in second half. Really missing the conductor in the first half. Need to involve Ode more.
CoyrrGs ⚽ ⚽ ⚽
Xhaka would be good to have when we need more toughness like today, T. Sambi can’t do it, and I don’t see it from Partey.
The Brighton side are well drilled and are a good passing side and it would seem we need to review our tactics especially in midfield. The commentator did make the point that maybe some would appreciate the influence of Xhaka with the way our midfield has been by-passed so often.
Having said that, we have not conceded yet, despite the chances the hosts have created. We need to step things up a bit and believing we have the better players, take the game by the scruff. It’s hard to call but we are showing unusual grit and this may be a telling feature.
Saka needs to support Tomi a bit more as he is being dragged all over the place even as the midfield is being pulled apart regularly. Some of the senior players are feeling the weight of expectation and holding back, methinks. We have Pepe, Laca, Martinelli and even Elneny on the bench. Let’s see who can come on to change it up a bit for us. We can still make this another ugly win but, I suspect Graham Porter will want to have a say in that one.
7:1 is the key pass ratio at half time. Not in our favor.
Some uncharacteristic defensive errors from Tomiyasu, White and Ramsdale, but nothing punished fortunately.
Agreeing with TA, that Ode should be involved more – maybe Lokonga too – and Partey should shoot less. Tierney and ESR are also underutilized, but we don’t attack effectively on either side or at the middle either.
We ought to improve up front without deteriorating at the back. This game could go either way, and I would rather not root for a draw.
White also has to remember this is his old stomping ground and just show a bit more passion. It is looking to be the proverbial game of two halves, hopefully.
John Moss would be looking to intervene, somehow……
Overall it’s fair to say if anyone deserved 3 points it would have been Brighton. We were lucky to get 1.
Sambi was bad.
Partey was worse.
Øde looked a little out of sorts.
The worst conditions we have played in for quite a while. But they looked like they practice in that every day.
Most of the first half we looked like we were 2 men down. They were winning every ball in midfield, so many around our box, and even a lot in our box. They looked so sharp, but I think it was because we were dull.
BHA was the better team on the pitch, so we rather snatched a point than lost 2.
Burn, Cucurella and Trossard performed better than Arsenal player. I am satisfied with Gabriel and Lokonga only, but nobody was particularly bad (apart from that @$$hole Maupay), however Auba and Tierney both played well below their standard.
That’s not the best sign before the international break, but in reality Brighton did became a strong team while nobody noticed…
Agreed with J, the look of the play was indeed as we were a man short.
In the boys’ defense, this weather didn’t suit the style of players with more technical ability than stature (ESR, Odegaard), and Auba’s pace couldn’t materialize either. Whit the substitutions we were equal, but by that time the game was practically over.
We played under par, indeed. But the boys fought hard for that point. One goal conceded in the last four games is also v promising.
On this early evidence, we are really going to miss Xhaka.
Credit to Brighton, they pushed up on our full backs and gave us all sorts of problems, we didn’t make the most of our best situations with some sloppy passing when well set to hit them on the break, Odegaard had a quiet game, but it happens.
Interesting to note that for all their opportunities Brighton had only two efforts on target, the same as Arsenal, I really thought that Smith Rowe was gonna nick it for us in the 2nd half. I’d really like to see some more invention put into our free kicks. Odegaard this season and Willian last, but I can’t of many others, they usually sail over the bar.
The one free kick we had was wasted. No good in a game with so few chances for us.. Ødegaard or Mikel – take control. It’s Ødes job. No fooling around with others unless it’s an impossible angle for a left foot, which is rare.
We looked outnumbered in mf because whenever we had the ball, we weren’t able to find an option to maintain possession, let alone pass ahead.
Even though I’m obviously unhappy. Emile was decent, as Gabriel was, who is almost always good.
I never usually mention weather, but conditions were disgusting, you can tell by the lack of distance on Aaron’s kicks.
Again, Partey was so disappointing when we needed him most without Xhaka. Long shots from him and Lokonga were wasteful. 4 or 5 possessions.
New Post 🙂