So off we go again: Arsnenal v Lille – and it appears to be a first ever!

 

 

• Arsenal v LOSC: the background to LOSC and the tie
• ManC can’t even see how much each new mistake is damaging them

By Tony Attwood

Now here is a funny thing I have never come across before.   According to the various sources of information I use to find past historic results between clubs Arsenal and Lille have not played each other before.    So finally in utter desperation I typed into Google “Have Arsenal and LOSC Lille ever played each other before?”    Google, as is its habit these days took me to its AI Overview which said, “No, Arsenal has never played a competitive match against LOSC Lille before.” 

I must admit I do like proving AI wrong, but this time I have not been able to.  As far as I know this is a first.

So here we are, our first game against Lille and the start at home of the Champions League, having beaten Napoli but just the one goal.    And we are still winning games, beating Coventry, Aston Villa, Chelsea, Napoli, Sunderland, Ipswich, and Leeds.  Just the one hiccup in between with Brighton.  But still a lot of goals being scored which is rather pleasant.  And I always get hiccups at Brighton anyway.

In fact at home in the Champions League the last time we had a problem was with Inter Milan getting on for two years ago. 

And here’s another snippet I have not seen before.   Arsenal had a rating of 4.05 Expected Goals against Napoli at the quaintly named Stadio Diego Armando Maradona, (or Maldonado as my spell checker wants to put it) which I think is the highest rating for an Arsenal Champs League game.  

And using the quaint linguistic style that some journalists now think is becoming one has written this morning, I wrote in my draft “More motivated than ever to finally conquer the continent…”  but then when I went to attribute the phrase to whatever website I nicked it from, I couldn’t find it.   Instead AI replied, “That is the perfect mindset to have!”   Hell, my writing is now being praised by AI.   Time to go wandering in the outback (well Corby) I think.

But to pull this together Arsenal have two defeats from the last 31 league phase/group stages games arranged by the mighty Uefa and have scored “three or more goals in five of their last six home fixtures at this stage,” or so I am told. 

But the negativism of journalism replies !James Justin’s opening goal in North London also continued a worsening defensive trend for Arsenal, who have now conceded six goals across their last three games in all tournaments,” so everything is falling apart.

Lille have themselves have been doing moderately ok, having beaten Troyes, lost away to Nice and beaten Le Havre.

But put it another way, Lille have won three, lost two and drawn one of the last six, which means there is no consistency for them to rely on in this game.

Meanwhile on the fitness front most of the players who were doubtful seem to be ok to play including Rice, Dowman, Konsa and Havertz which means we are without Tzolis and Saliba – which is in fact pretty much as expected.   Matters don’t look too good for Piero Hincapie however.  

But what of Olivier Giroud now with the opposition?   Apparently he is now 40 years old, but I am not sure we are going to see him play.  But we are told he “spearheaded the attack last time out, but the veteran is now expected to make way for Ayase Ueda.”

The disagreement among the pundits is over Zubimendi – some say he will play and some not because of an injury during training.

All of this shuffling around could mean a team of  

Raya;

Timber, Konsa, Gabriel, Calafiori;

Guimaraes, Zubimendi;

Saka, Odegaard, Eze;

Gyokeres

Football Line ups offer something quite different howver….

David Raya,

Lewis-Skelly, Konsa, White, Calafiori,

Gabriel, Rice, Ødegaard,

Saka, Havertz, Madueke,

As for the future after this match, that looks very mixed.

On 18 October we have Nottingham Forest, on 21 October it is Bayern Munich, then it is Everton and then Fleetwood Town.   So there is plenty of chance for the manager to shift the players around a bit if he wants to.

Lille’s last four games have been two wins by 2-1 and two defeats by 2-0 and 2-3.  Arsenal’s last four games have been  a 2-1, 4-2 and 2-0 win and a 0-3 defeat.   So the clear task is to show that the game against Brighton and Hove was just a total, weird and virtually inexplicable aberration, and we are now back on track for the rest of the season.