Sometimes the Arsenal journalists have only as much idea as I do. The team….

By Tony Attwood

“The suffocating tension at Arsenal” was recently pronounced by a number of websites, but I have to say most of my pals and I are not suffering but actually enjoying what’s going on.  I do recall that towards the end of the Unbeaten Season, the tension was overwhelming, but that was because the club were going for the ultimate unique prize.  Now we’re not.  It’s just a case of winning the league for the 14th time, the FA Cup for the 15th time, the League Cup for the third time and the Champions League for the first time  I mean, who is going to get worked up about that?

Besides, we are on a run of 13 games unbeaten, which has beaten the previous run of 12 games unbeaten, which started on 10 December.  So we have already overtaken our previous run and are heading for equalling our first run of this season of 18 games unbeaten in all competitions.   Which by and large, is quite a few games unbeaten.

Now I know journalists don’t like to mention these things because it involves numbers above nine, which they can find a bit tricky, but we can put it another way and say that Arsenal have lost three games all season.   And for the raging negativists who like to quote these things here they are…

So that’s the lot.  But if you want to knock Arsenal a bit (whihc quite a few scribblers have done today), you can say Arsenal are now on the longest winning run in the Premier League at four consecutive games. 

So inevitably, the media mostly focus on the failure of Premier League clubs in Europe, beacuse ManC aren’t there winning stuff.  The view in several outlets is that most clubs have wasted money buying the wrong players, and this raises a really interesting thought.   Why don’t clubs hire the right managers who know what they are doing?   Like all these journalists who know everything, for example.  Lots of them seem to have a lot of spare time on their hands.

And we could throw in the fact that Arsenal had only the ninth-highest wage bill in Europe last season.  PSG and Barcelona led the way last season and probably still do.  Liverpool, Manchester City, Chelsea and Manchester United all spent more on salaries last season than Arsenal.  So we can even afford to reward our team at the end of this campaign.

So it is desperation time – at least for the journalists, as Football.London are reduced to writing the headline, “Eight players could miss Arsenal vs Leverkusen Champions League second leg with tie on knife-edge”  Read it quickly, and you might think that Arsenal have carelessly lost eight players in over-training before the game, but no, I think it means eight players from both sides added together..  And do notice they say “could” not “will”.   These journo chappies really are getting rather pesky as they try to worry Arsenal ahead of each game.

The Daily Canon might have a slightly greater grasp of reality with the headline, “1 back, 3 out: Arsenal injury update pre-Bayer Leverkusen clash”.  But I think for sanity’s sake we ought to turn to the EPL Injury Table for some vague semblance of reality.

Odegaard and Timber are both rated 50%, Trossard is available and fit, and Mikel Merino continues his long term recovery.  Tottenham are still top with 13 men unavailable, followed by Sunderland with eight men down.   At the other end Leeds and Wolverhampton both have one man out.

And so pulling all this together the Standard offer us

Raya;

Mosquera, Saliba, Gabriel, Calafiori;

Zubimendi, Rice;

Saka, Eze, Trossard;

Gyokeres

Sports Mole offer

Raya;

Mosquera, Saliba, Gabriel, Hincapie;

Zubimendi, Rice;

Madueke, Saka, Martinelli;

Gyokeres

.