Well, football gods aren’t treating us well so far this year. We started well against Brentford with a 3-1 away win but then gave away the advantage by drawing to Brighton at home. Newcastle beat us 2-0 at Emirates in the first leg of Carabao Cup semi final, we then lost to Man Utd at home in a penalty shootout which ended our FA Cup run. We did beat Spurs in the North London Derby but Emery made sure we grieve again against Villa. We are plagued with injuries with Bukayo Saka side-lined for a very long time, Jesus as well.
On one side, we have been out of FA cup and Carabao cup looks almost impossible since we have to visit Newcastle in the second leg and they have a 2 goal advantage. In the Premier League, we have been giving away points and chances to catch up to Liverpool who are sitting on a 6 point lead to us and got a game in hand.
On the other side, we are sitting 5th in the Champions League table with 13 points in 6 games and we have next two games against Dinamo Zagreb and Monaco. These are relatively easier games, though European nights are very unpredictable. A win against Dinamo today will make it easy for us to qualify for knockout stage.
William Saliba will miss the game due to the hamstring injury he picked up last week and it would take couple more weeks for him to recover. Calafiori and Nwaneri were back in training but they will need another evaluation before the game. The usuals – Saka, White, Tomiyasu, Jesus remains unavailable.
Arteta in his press conference gave the reason for playing Partey at RB – unavailability of players. Now I can understand that, when Timber was injured and we didn’t have anyone to play on the left. Recently, MLS has been sensational in the LB position and Timber is back at RB, but he has got another problem with Saliba’s injury. Take it with a pinch of salt but some of the publications were reporting that he might try Declan Rice at CB. Rice was playing in that position at West Ham academy. I would take that over playing Thomas Partey at RB.
Here’s what Mikel had to say about playing Thomas at RB.
I had no choice, I didn’t have another right full-back, just Jurrien, nobody else. Who plays when Jurrien isn’t available for his load is too high? The other day was the first time [he moved Jurrien to centre-back] but in relation to the way we have to play, we cannot have a right-footed player defending a right winger. I didn’t have another right-sided centre-back.
source : Arsenal.com
RW is another problem. Martinelli is not cutting it and I have no idea why we got Sterling in first place. A sane manager would send him back to Chelsea and recall Nelson.
Right, I am looking forward to the game. Mathematically there are 16 other clubs competing for top 8 with us, and a win today will make it smaller.
Lets do it. #COYG
In all these the two header miss of Kai is forgotten.
Tony
Being 6 foot 3 will have that effect!
Marc
3 at the back was my pre match call because Wolves are that poor.
Marc—I do agree with your questions involving MA’s sub choices, but that’s what happens when you have a bench full of defenders…this is when paper mache Merino might have come in handy
TRVL
Lots of teams play “tactical” fouls and take a booking – for it to be a red it usually has to be either a second yellow or deny a goal scoring opportunity.
Lets leave it and see the media reaction over the next day or so – the neutral view will be “what the fuck”.
Madhu—I certainly didn’t forget…he keeps this up he’ll have to lean into the whole social media abuse gig again
Pool 3:0 up so we need the points and hope for a City v Chavs draw
We’re going to lose this 1 nil.
Marc—the “neutral” observer would only say that because they love when we, in particular, go ape with our tin foil hats firmly affixed
TRVL
We’ll see.
I still think we’re the more likely to get a result, unless MA’s balls crawl back into his pelvis region and he’s willing to settle for a single point
Adebayor (who needed at least 7 attempts to score) would be on a hattrick already.
I can see us nicking it now Havertz had missed 3 normally he scores the 4th, as Rays saves our blushes.
Cunha misses ,look so understanble.
Is his status already oura Wolves ?
Cunha showing exactly why he’s not the answer, as we don’t need another player who can’t find the back of the net from close range…I hesitated to post this just in case my posting curse reared it’s ugly head again
Problem is we have no strikers on the bench
You talk to a wolves fan and since iam in Midlands I do talk to a lot of them, they feel they get the wrong end of ref decision always.
Cunha has been poor so not for me
Ambarish—there’s no way Ode would have been sacrificed like Ethan, which just shows you the lack of faith MA has in him…MA probably said fuck the kids after the red
Tony
We’ve got strikers anywhere at all?