Fortunately for Arsenal, there was no gruelling midweek FA Cup replay up at Sunderland this week after Arsene Wenger’s men comfortably dispatched of the Black Cats in the third round in the end.
What does lay in prospect for the Gunners however is a Super Sunday clash with bogey side and London rivals Chelsea, whom they haven’t even scored against in 450 minutes (five games) of Premier League football.
For whatever reason, Arsenal have come up against some sort of mental block when it comes to facing the side from West London but with Jose Mourinho no longer around, perhaps this is the Gunners’ best chance of turning the stats around with Guus Hiddink’s team steady, yet still susceptible at the back.
The Gunners have just come through a difficult run of away games at both Liverpool and Stoke and for optimistic Gooners, they’re claiming it is great to still be top while having been undefeated at two difficult away grounds,
For pessimistic ones on the other hand, to throw away four points to a below-par Liverpool side (considering how late the Reds’ equaliser was), not to mention at Stoke who for their cracking record against the Gunners should still be getting beat by potential champions, it isn’t enough.
Therefore, in the eyes of the latter set of fans, Sunday’s game is a must win in order to cease giving any more encouragement to Manchester City who seem to be hitting their stride once again.
So far this January transfer window, Arsene Wenger has moved to bring in FC Basel’s Mohamed Elneny but today, we’ve read in Metro that the Gunners are reportedly chasing a double deal for both Lars Bender and Granit Xhaka who are now reportedly available for the right price.
While our punters and landlord can’t see two more defensive midfielders arriving this January, their transfers could be sanctioned in the summer with Mikel Arteta, Tomas Rosicky and Mathieu Flamini moving on.
With this in mind, we’ve devised a best Arsenal XI with the two potential future signings included to see how they’d fit in.
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Click on the image below to reveal the dream Arsenal XI under Arsene Wenger including Lars Bender and Granit Xhaka.
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Petr Cech
It’s remarkable just how professional Petr Cech is with The Mirror having already claimed that the former Chelsea stopper speaks to his Arsenal defence in THREE different languages.
Going above and beyond the call of duty in this way, Cech’s determination and winning mentality seems to have made a world of difference to this Arsenal side whose fans have had to put up with the likes of Manuel Almunia, Vito Mannone and Wojciech Szczesny down the years.
After the Stoke game on Sunday, Arsene Wenger alluded to the goalkeepers’ slot being an underrated position and who knows, the sole signature of Cech last summer could prove the difference in this Arsenal side.
With Wenger admitting this now, we just wonder why it took him so long to lure a top class keeper like Cech!
Hector Bellerin
The sole reason why Mathieu Debuchy has been left sulking and whining about making a January transfer window loan move away from Arsenal this winter, Hector Bellerin just hasn’t looked back since his debut at Borussia Dortmund last term.
In fairness, his debut was tricky to say the least in an away loss to the German giants but he remained headstrong and put in consistent performances for his age in a season that culminated in a second FA Cup triumph in quick succession.
Having wobbled from his usually high standards around the mid-point of this campaign, we mustn’t forget that the Spaniard is still young and will only get better each season.
Per Mertesacker
For some, he remains a weakness in this Arsenal side; for others, they believe he’s still a great reader of the game who needs to be playing due to his experience.
Mertesacker is clearly not everybody’s cup of tea but what is true is that both he and Laurent Koscielny have enjoyed a fruitful partnership in recent seasons at Emirates Stadium.
Bringing the best out of each other with the German a great reader of the game and Koscielny able to do a little bit of everything, the problem seems to be when the Frenchman isn’t around.
Laurent Koscielny
The best centre back in the Premier League right now?
Our Arsenal supporters seem to think so and surely Laurent Koscielny is one of Arsene Wenger’s best ever finds having joined from relative obscurity in France.
Boasting a little bit of everything in his game, Koscielny’s recovery pace and aggression stand out as his two biggest attributes with the French international never shying away from a tackle.
More of a threat than Mertesacker from corners as well, Koscielny does score the odd goal for Arsenal and every Gooner is praying that he stays fit between now and the end of the season because without him, Arsenal are half the team at the back.
Nacho Monreal
Signing a new long-term deal with Arsenal this week, Nacho Monreal is the Gunners’ turnaround man having gone from zero to unsung hero!
Rather unfairly pushed into duty at centre back in the early part of last season due to Arsene Wenger’s negligence in not replacing Thomas Vermaelen amid an injury crisis, Monreal used the second half of the campaign to prove to everybody just how good he can be in his usual left back slot.
Going on to prove a crucial part of Arsenal’s second FA Cup success in quick succession, the Spaniard rarely has a bad game nowadays and it is his consistency in performances that really stands out.
Lars Bender
Arsenal links with Lars Bender have been going back donkeys years now and the latest ones by Metro haven’t been met by too much excitement at the bar given the cynicism around his potential whereabouts next season.
One of those players who surely needs to test himself at that next level beyond Bayer Leverkusen, Bender has always been highly-rated but has grown up in an era whereby the likes of Bastian Schweinsteiger and Toni Kroos have often fell above him in the pecking order for Germany.
Having won only 19 senior international caps since 2011, Bender isn’t such an established international but at club level, he’s a hardman who is capable of getting up and down with tremendous energy.
As discussed at the outset, with Arteta, Flamini and Rosicky moving on at the end of their contracts, despite Elneny’s arrival, there will be room for Wenger to add more central midfielders given Jack Wilshere’s injury troubles and Bender is the right age at 26-years-old.
Granit Xhaka
Now we know what you’re thinking; two Mr Arsenal-type players in Aaron Ramsey and Francis Coquelin are missing from this Arsenal XI but how else were we going to accommodate both Bender and Xhaka?
This is a question Arsene Wenger will have to mull over in his head if the reported interest is genuine in the summer but lets be honest, the likes of Cazorla, Ramsey, Coquelin and Wilshere are often injured so bolstering the ranks with even more talent is surely the best policy.
Xhaka is rated as one of the best midfielders in the Bundesliga alongside Bender and the latest on his situation is that Borussia Monchengladbach’s director Max Erbel has admitted: “I don’t know what will happen in the summer.
This sounds like the club are ready to cash in on the Swiss international to us but Arsenal’s path won’t be clear with other top English sides having been credited with an interest also.
Theo Walcott
Theo Walcott celebrated 10 years at Arsenal yesterday and the bar was rife with comments about whether the England international has really gone on to progress as he should have done in that time.
To be completely honest, the consensus was that Walcott hasn’t with injuries costing him so many full seasons in a Gunners shirt.
At the same time, Walcott has matured as a human as well as a football player and certainly has kept his feet on the ground despite having endured so much fame as a teenager with that 2006 World Cup call-up and what have you.
Walcott has one FA Cup medal to show for his Arsenal career given he wasn’t a part of the 2014/15 triumph and he’ll be hoping he can add a Premier League title to that this season.
He does have to pick up his game at the moment however with Walcott having gone through the motions since his goal in the 2-1 win over Manchester City back in December.
Mesut Ozil
He’s taken his Arsenal career to new levels this season with 99.9 per cent of English football fans having now woken up to the sheer talent that Mesut Ozil possesses.
Starting his Gunners career slow, Ozil has taken a little longer than expected to come to the boil but with an assists record like his, can his contribution ever be brought into question any more?
Simply putting balls on a plate for his team-mates to gobble up, its the weight of Ozil’s passing that separates him apart from the rest as one of the best number 10’s in world football.
Missing the Stoke game at the weekend, everybody hopes he’s back for the Chelsea game although the Blues have managed to stifle the German international’s influence in recent head-to-heads.
Alexis Sanchez
How Arsenal miss this man right now!
Although Joel Campbell has done a tremendous job since Alexis Sanchez got injured away at Norwich City, what team couldn’t benefit from having the tireless Chilean within it?
Perhaps a talent such as Alexis could have turned the last two Arsenal draws into wins such is his desire to keep on running to the final whistle while being good enough to conjure up a piece of magic out of nothing.
Maybe his first season in English football was better than this one but the Chilean set the bar so high last season that even he hasn’t been able to catch up with himself.
But there shouldn’t be any criticism where Alexis is concerned given he’s proved to be an absolutely cracking piece of business just like Petr Cech.
Olivier Giroud
The opinion splitter heads off our team but at the end of the day, Olivier Giroud has been a fantastic Arsenal signing and all for £12 million to boot.
While the Gunners may need a Robert Lewandowski or Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang to win the Premier League title, Olivier Giroud is in that category below but at the same time, he brings things to this Arsenal team that others couldn’t.
Giving Arsene Wenger’s side a different dimension in holding up the ball and bullying opposition defences on days where he looks up for it, everybody’s frustrations with the French international is that he seems to go within himself on other days.
It’s a matter of consistency with Giroud but 53 Premier League goals in 118 top flight performances is hardly the form of a flop!
