Arsenal’s injury list now has nine names: Vermaelen, Squillaci, Djourou, Wilshere, Diaby, Benayoun, Gervinho, Walcott and Koscielny.
Hopefully Arsene Wenger is just being overly cautious about the last three with an eye to Sunday’s game away to Spurs. But having four of the first team squad’s six central defenders out obviously poses a problem.
Tonight’s game should be straightforward, with Olympiacos the weakest team in the group. It’s a popular cliche to say there are no easy games in football. There are easy games, but sometimes a team can complacently contrive to mess them up.
The two Manchester clubs provided a warning last night. United thought they were sweeping Basel away and threw a two goal lead. They then had to battle back to salvage a draw. City thought their mighty Galactico’s would rampage over Bayern Munich and went our without their customary two holding-player formation. By the time they got round to changing tack, Bayern were all over them and won 2:0.
Arsenal take note, the easy games are easy when you do your job properly.
Last time we had Olympiacos in our Champions League group we won at home and lost away. The away defeat came at the end when we had already won the group and fielded a team largely made up of young reserves. At least Tom Cruise and Kerrea Gilbert can say they’ve played Champions League football. If you want the full SP, Modern Gooner has done his usual thorough job.
So how will Arsene Wenger plug the gaps tonight? Looking around the various Arsenal blogs, overnight opinion seems to favour experienced players out of position rather than new blood.
The popular choice or prediction is to drop Song back into defence rather than risk Miquel, with Frimpong or Coquelin as the holding midfielder. Up front most reckon Rosicky being pushed further forward rather than a start for Park.
Personally I worry about players out of position and suggested Miquel and Park, but we’ll have to wait and see.
A draw away to Dortmund was fine, but we need three points today. We learnt last year how failing to win the group pitches you in against the likes of Barcelona in the first knock-out round and we need to avoid that.
Then there’s the fact that winning against Bolton was just another step forward rather than an emphatic return to form. But play as well as we did in the second half last Saturday and we will be fine.
Come on you Gunners!
Related posts:
