Kevin Whitcher
Saturday – Nice to see Sanogo score four times, and Joel Campbell appear in an Arsenal shirt after all these years. Benfica’s mix and match side started with about three players who began May’s Europa League Final. They weren’t exactly at full strength, and played at times like they had never been on the same football pitch before. There may be an element of truth in this, and it is certainly a reason not to read too much into pre-season run outs. Then again, you could make the same argument about Arsenal. Taking the FA Cup Final starting eleven, only two of that side began against Benfica. So what we can conclude is that Yaya Sanogo can finish, and – regards the goal conceded, concentration isn’t as sharp as it will need to be when the real thing begins against Palace on 16th August. The crowd were thrilled to see Alexis make a cameo appearance, and he did look sharp, interested and full of tricks. One imagines his first three or four appearances may be curtailed after 70 minutes, as he plays his way to match fitness, but he certainly does not look like he overdid the fajitas on post World Cup Mexican holiday.
As for Sunday, a stronger staring line-up, and facing a Monaco side whose season starts a week earlier than Arsenal’s, so presumably a little further along the road where sharpness is concerned. The goal that won the game was disappointing to concede. Koscielny seemed to lose Falcao although I have read elsewhere that he was relying on an offside line that wasn’t happening. On the Saturday I noticed Calum Chambers doing a lot of barking at centre back – which I always like to see. However, if Koscielny and the new boy are to begin against Palace, their understanding needs to improve pretty quickly. Going forward, Arsenal looked better with Alexis in the centre after the interval than they did with Giroud in the first half. Granted, Giroud is not match fit by a long way, but the pace and angles of Alexis’ runs were what made the difference. Giroud is a player that gets soaked into the play behind him, a hold up man. This can work if you have two forwards playing off each other, but in the Gunners’ formation with two wide attackers, however mobile they may be, it showed that they are slightly handicapped by having a relatively immobile target man isolated in the middle. It will be interesting to see how the season develops where the Frenchman is concerned, but my suspicion is he may become a last 20 minute battering ram, starting the odd match against less resistant opposition in the way Bendtner was used last season when he was still being considered as an option.
There is lots of talk about the Khedira deal not being dead just yet. That he seems to be a big buddy of Ozil might tempt him to make the move rather than wait for a Bosman next summer. It partly depends on his ambition – whether maxing out on income means more to him than playing. Alexis Sanchez could see the writing on the wall once Barcelona bought Luis Suarez, and he wasn’t even starting habitually last term. I suspect his pay packet has increased a little at Arsenal, but then, I imagine so would Khedira’s. It really depends on how happy a player is to sacrifice a year of his career when he knows he will mainly be on the bench. Let’s hope he wants to play regularly and decides to move to London. It is indisputably the one area of the team which needs strengthening.
This pre-season was always going to be a rather disjointed one, and the strength of the squad will be important in the first month as the returning World Cup players are not going to be playing every match. The club could have done without a Champions League qualifier, and there are some decent sides that could cause an upset. I suspect we will see stronger line-ups in those matches than certain of the early Premier League games. That draw is on Friday. Arsenal’s opponent is most likely to be one of Atletico Bilbao, Copenhagen, Besiktas, Lille or Panathinaikos, although this is dependent on the midweek 2nd legs for these clubs.
Next Sunday at Wembley will hopefully be an enjoyable day out, although it is still a pre-season warm up game when all is said and done. Nice to win, but no-one mourns too long if it doesn’t happen. If Arsenal are beaten by a hatful, I might retract that though. It would be re-assuring if they looked like they could go toe-to-toe with City’s players in their individual battles. The first issue of The Gooner this season goes on sale for that game. We will have a seller on the route from Wembley Park tube station and hopefully another covering the Wembley Stadium station. The issue has just gone to press and features Alexis on the front cover.
And to finish a habitual mention for a new book that I have co-authored with Alex Fynn. It’s a sequel to Arsènal – The Making of a Modern Superclub and entitled Arsène and Arsenal The Quest to Rediscover Past Glories. It takes up the story of the club from the last update of the previous book, and can be bought online here.
