Arsenal take on Aston Villa at Villa Park this evening, needing a win to keep hopes of European qualification via the Premier League alive.
The hosts need a win to try and stave off relegation to the Championship. This won’t be easy, particularly after Saturday night’s massive effort against Man City (haha Pep!).
Here are the official line-ups.
Aston Villa: Reina, Elmohamady, Konsa, Mings, Targett, McGinn, Douglas, Hourihane, Trezeguet, Samtala, Grealish
Subs: Nyland, Guilbert, Hause, Nakamba, Lansbury, Jota, El Ghazi, Vassilev, Davis
Arsenal: Martinez, Holding, Luiz, Kolasinac, Cedric, Torreira, Ceballos, Saka, Lacazette, Aubameyang, Nketiah
Subs: Macey, Bellerin, Tierney, Sokratis, Maitland-Niles, Willock, Xhaka, Smith, Pepe
Don’t think we’ve ever seen Eddie and Laca start at the same time?
No, interesting
Has anyone figured out the formation, yet? Is it Eddie on the right or a 4-4-2 with Auba on the left and Saka on the right? Or something completely different?
It didn’t work.
Interested to see whether Saka is going to play as the left sided 8 or the wingback role that AMN played the other day.
Looks like it can only be Saka as a LWB, no? Center 3 of Holding/Luiz/Kola, Cedric and Saka on the wings.
I’d bet on a back 4 with the more mobile Torreira anchoring.
Yeap, it’s a 4-3-3 formation.
What if, it is a 3-4-3 with Lacazette as our own Firmino (a little bit behind Auba and Nketiah)?
Likely to be the typically fluid back 5 out of possession and back 4 with the ball. Arteta has been pretty consistent with this, it just looks different in different matches because in some matches we don’t have a lot of the ball (vs City, ‘pool, Sheffield and Wolves away at times) so it looks predominantly like we are playing 3/5 at the back, whereas today, hopefully we’ll have more of the ball and control the game, meaning that it will look predominantly like a back 4. I’m pretty sure that the reason that Arteta is persisting with Kola in… Read more »
Spot on
Reiss injured ?
Yeah, very curious.
Reiss’s in pieces
Well if this eleven can’t beat their no players 11 plus 9otger twats with no name then we don’t deserve to get into Europe
At this point FA Cup is our best bet due to other results.
Gotta be positive though, some young gooners on the field looking to make an impact is great to see.
Sorry for the confusing statement but it was only meant to be a joke as when I wrote it, blogs hadn’t yet posted the villa sides players or subs. My non spell check typing didn’t help either! COYG
Thought might see some more youngsters, in the squad at least. Surprised too see Auna and Lacca start, thought at least one would be rested. Also expected Sok to start over Luiz, again with an eye on cup final. Still, those 3 up front we may get goal difference we need to catch those above!
What the shit?? Lacazette, Auba AND Nketiah? Madness!
Goal Rush
Thought we’d see Auba rested, he looked so tired by the end of the game against City. He seems like an incredible athlete, but still thought Arteta might have been keeping an eye on the FA cup final given that european qualification via the league looks like a pretty remote possibility at this point (after Leicester did us no favours this past weekend)
I don’t think there’s any need to rest people for the Cup final, because we’ll have a full week off before it. Everyone will be well rested. I’m happy Aubameyang’s playing – I’d like to see him score a hat trick today to pass that twat Vardy in the Golden Boot race.
Interesting choice of strikers. I don’t see Eddie as a winger.
Perhaps the plan is for Eddie and Laca to play as 2 up front, but that would mean Auba playing deeper, with Saka on the other wing of a 3 5 2?
After we beat Villa 5-0 today, we’ll have:
Wolves 59 pts, +13
Spurms 58 pts, +14
ARSENAL 56 pts, +13
On the final day:
Chel$ki 2-0 Wolves
Palace 1-1 Spurms
ARSENAL 2-0 Twatford
ARSENAL 59 pts, +15
Spurms 59 pts, +14
Wolves 59 pts +11
And we finish 6th. It’s doable!
Madness, but I like it!
Egg meet face
I actually think this is our best midfield pairing as far as technical capacity is concerned. Hope Torreira can remind everyone just how good he can be.
I must say torriera at the moment looks like a player that has just come back from injury
Has looked dreadful so far. Add Holding and Cedric to the list as well. Lacazette hasn’t been great, either.
None of our midfield has looked convincing so far this game, but our creative play from the wings has been horrible
A bit harsh of Ceballos, he’s been everywhere.
Torreira is too small and gets bullied off the ball. Always. He should be sold and replaced with a stronger player, he keeps on about going to Italy, sell him to Gazidis.
Had Sokrates started a game veith Arteta
Yes, but at right back?
Let’s get some goals early and get auba and laca some rest!
The Cup is clearly now the priority; let’s hope for three points tonight but also no further injuries. ?
We really need to do something about our midfield next season?
We really need a creative mid
FFS
Watching the first half there is no one, NO ONE, linking defence and attack. No one to break through the lines. If any teams sits off us we have no answer, no creativity, no one to dribble and beat a player.
He’ll I’d even settle for. Giroud to bounce balls off.
*hell – bloody auto correct. Not having a good evening.
We should never have sold Giroud, he was perfect for these situations.
Arteta got his tactics really wrong today. How we started with three at the back against a team that struggles with scoring is beyond me!
Awful substitutions leading to a bizarre formation. Kola is a shell of a player after his gaff, only knows how to slow down and break up our attacks then make a backward pass. Woeful.
Kola Kola Kola…the less said the better
This is as bad as its possible to play.
Outrageous amount of backwards passing.
We now sit below Burnley. Hurrah for us!
Beat Liverpool and City then lose to Villa without a shot on target.
So Arsenal…
No creativity. Defend and counter doesn’t work when the other team itself sits on a one-goal lead.
God what a miserable game. How did we generate so few chances?! The only time we created anything was down the right, and it was played so ponderously slow. We need some creativity and ambition in the middle of the park.
Arteta out.
My god, this club is a bloody embarrassment.
Only kidding with arteta out bit.
But this club is a joke right now. I’d take the Arsenal Ladies over the men’s side right now. They’ve got more spine.
Well that was a waste of an evening. We need to spend any money we have or can raise on midfield. It’s glaringly obvious against a villa side scrapping for their lives. Grealish, McGinn and Trezeguet all had much more movement fight and threat than any of our lot tonight.
I know last week’s wins were immense physically but the players selected tonight really didn’t do themselves any favours regarding getting into the cup final side.
Is Reiss Nelson injured?
Just found that Nelson is injured. Slight groin strain apparently.☹️
I thought the tank looked empty tonight, tired legs and tired minds. Shame that Nelson wasn’t fit as I think he would have started wide right.