Arsenal begin their League Cup campaign with a tricky looking down at Portman Road against newly promoted Ipswich Town in what is likely to contain two much changed teams. Arsenal fell at the final hurdle in the League Cup last season with a painful defeat to Manchester City at Wembley, so although this competition probably ranks fairly low in terms of priorities, you just know that Mikel Arteta will be desperate to go one better again this season.
The match
Feels like a lot depends on how serious Ipswich take this game to me. Arsenal will almost certainly rotate their whole eleven, but given the depth of our squad these days, you’re still talking two World Cup Winners, s £60m striker, couple of £50-60m wingers, a defence stacked with players who start for most teams in the Premier Leauge and the world’s most expensive goalkeeper. It’s not bad is it?
With the greatest respect to our opponents tonight, Ipswich Town, if they were to rotate in the same way, the gulf in quality between the two lineups would be quite significant, but then again some of our players will be rusty, so it is hard to call.
If Ipswich go strong, they do have players that can hurt us, so that needs to be taken into account as well, but I did hear Gary O’Neill saying he will rotate, so make of that what you will.
The lineup
Probably the hardest lineup to predict so far this season, but I’ll give it a go! There are some definites, so let’s get them out of the way first. Kepa will definitely start, as will Piero Hincapie, Martin Zubimendi, Mikel Merino, Eberechi Eze, Noni Madueke and Viktor Gyokeres, so that sorts out seven of the eleven. Of the other four, I think Arteta will have to get a bit creative and maybe split the minutes of the defenders so that they don’t overload any of the players who have played a lot of minutes so far.
Will he start, Marli Salmon? That’s the question that I keep coming back to. I think he will. Next question is, where? So far, he’s preferred to play the youngest at full back, to take him out of the pressure of playing in the centre, but after his performances in pre-season, I think he’ll take a different approach this season and play him in his natural position.
Another question that has a big impact on the starting defenders – is Cristhian Mosquera fit again? Arteta said he was close for the game at Sunderland, so again I’m going yes. So I think he’ll start Mosquera and Salmon at the back together, with Hincapie at left back and Jurrien Timber at right back, with the latter likely subbed around 60 minutes.
Next question – Bruno Guimaraes or Myles Lewis-Skelly in midfield. I think he’ll give Bruno his first start and keep Lewis-Skelly on the bench. He has played quite a lot so far this season and he did look a bit out of sorts against Sunderland, so the rest will do him good. Think that’s it, isn’t it?
Feels strange not to start Max Dowman in a game like this but I really don’t know where you would play him, so he’ll have to settle for an appearence from the bench. I can see Jaden Dixon and Andre Harriman-Annous making the bench and potentially receiving minutes if things are going well, but the rest will be loaded with first teamers, just in case things go in a different direction.
Predicted lineup:
Arrizabalaga
Timber
Mosquera
Salmon
Hincapie
Zubimendi
Guimaraes
Merino
Madueke
Gyokeres
Eze
Subs:
Meslier
Konsa
Gabriel
Dixon
Rice
Odegaard
Havertz
Dowman
Harriman-Annous
Prediction
I really hate how these games straight to penalties these days, as it just feels like too much of a lottery for drawing after 90 minutes, so we’ll have to make sure we get the job done in normal time. I’m going 3-0 to The Arsenal.
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