By Bulldog Drummond
These are indeed strange times, for no longer are all of Arsenal’s top players about the leave the club because our directors and managers and the cleaning company are all too slow, and who would ever want to be at Arsenal anyway, but now suddenly in a trice, we find that it is other clubs who fear that their stars are coming to Arsenal.
Well! Would you believe it?
Actually, you shouldn’t of course, for just because last season’s “Arsenal too slow” and “Arsenal risk losing…” type stories were jibberish, so are most of these “Arsenal expected to sign” tales. Thus when FootballTransferTavern tell us that “Chelsea now worried Kante will join Arsenal,” we can smile and nod knowingly, understanding that it’s as made up as the notion that aliens from Jupiter’s second moon have landed on the pitch making it unplayable for this evening’s game. Especially as the story is “according to reports.“
Meanwhile “Arsenal tipped to sign Brazilian sensation – he’s been dubbed the ‘next Pele’ might be fractionally more believable given that it isn’t everywhere. This one is according to Ryan Smart in Sports Bible. They tell us that Gilberto Silva has indicated that Arsenal will sign another youngster: Endrick. He’s 16 and he’s currently with Palmeiras – with whom he signed a three-year contract earlier this year. But then, what are contracts when it’s a matter of football.
As for the match itself FootballFanCast tell us that Arteta could finally unleash Arsenal’s 19 y/o “wizard” vs PSV, he’s “eager to impress”. But they then go further and say, “Mikel Arteta must unleash Catalin Cirjan vs PSV.” And this is because he was, “spotted in training with the Gunners’ first team squad on Wednesday afternoon”
Elsewhere Just Arsenal report that Evan Ndicka will sign for Arsenal because his contract runs out at the end of this season, and the player won’t resign with Eintracht Frankfurt.
HITC have however done us the honour of supplying a team-sheet in advance and with an interesting shape…
Turner;
Tomiyasu, Holding, Gabriel, Tierney;
Lokonga;
Saka, Vieira, Xhaka, Nelson;
Nketiah.
There is also talk about the manager of PSV, Ruud van Nistelrooy, with commentaries that take us back to Van Nistelrooy’s missed penalty and Martin Keown’s calm and considered reaction at Wembley
The Standard has its usual confirmed team news, which shouldn’t be taken to mean too much. In essence, they say Martinelli and Zinchenko are “major doubts”.
They predict a similar lineup but with different positional representations.
Turner;
Tomiyasu, Holding, Gabriel, Tierney;
Vieira, Lokonga, Xhaka;
Saka, Nketiah, Nelson.
Sportsmole gives us a run down on injuries noting that Smith Rowe and Elneny are still out. As for the opposition’s injuries they report on, Yorbe Vertessen (muscle), Ismael Saibari (hamstring), Olivier Boscagli (knee) and Marco van Ginkel (hamstring). And going even further they also note that Cody Gakpo, (rumoured to be a player Arsenal want to sign) will be showing off his abilities.
Sportsmole’s lineup does however have a variation from the others…
Turner;
White, Holding, Gabriel, Tierney;
Xhaka, Partey;
Saka, Vieira, Nelson;
Nketiah
But now here is something that I found rather droll, not to say amusing. Read the following sentence:
“Arsenal have not been entirely convincing in their last two matches, doing just about enough to get past Bodo/Glimt and Leeds”
That sentence word for word turns up on Yahoo’s coverage. And in the Standard. And in the English Daily News. And in Public News Time. And in Today News UK . And in FastHeadline.com And in TimesNewsUK
And so on. Now that is where the exact copy is copied (as it were). If we are looking at the way a message is repeated over and over, the number of semi-copies runs into thousands. This is why the little publications tend to ignore information about referees. Because the bigger publications won’t touch it, so the tale never reaches the farmyard.
And now here’s a footnote. The next round of the Europa after the group stages is the knockout round play-off and is played in February next year. Group winners don’t play in this knockout round, but go straight into the Round of 16 in March, so winning the group would be worthwhile just to avoid two extra games in February.
Bodo/Glimt can only reach 10 points so a single point from any of Arsenal’s remaining three games will guarantee at least second place.
Winning all their matches PSV can get 15, Arsenal can reach 18. But of course two of the games for PSV and Arsenal are against each other. A win for Arsenal tonight gives us 12 and PSV 7. Then a win against Zurich at home (which does seem rather likely) would be enough to win the group even if we lose the away game against PSV.
| Team | P | W | D | L | F | A | GD | PTS | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Arsenal |
3 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 6 | 1 | 5 | 9 |
| 2 | PSV | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 11 | 2 | 9 | 7 |
| 3 | Bodo Glimt | 4 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 6 | -3 | 4 |
| 4 | Zurich | 4 | 0 | 0 | 4 | 3 | 14 | -11 | 0 |
