Sunday, August 28, 2011

Arsenal Faces a Long List of Problems as They Prepare to Face Manchester United

Arsenal following a Champions League play-off match will travel to Old Trafford to take on Manchester United.

Walcott celebrates his winning goal in midweek.

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In their last four matches at Old Trafford, Arsenal has failed to record a single win. Last season, despite all their problems, Arsenal finally managed to beat Manchester United at Emirates after a few seasons. Aaron Ramsey scored in a match which Arsenal completely dominated.

Arsenal is winless following two games in the English Premier League. Manchester United, as expected, has two wins out of two on the board. Their first game was an away fixture against West Bromwich Albion. In typical United fashion, they won the game after the 80th minute through Ashley Young.

Most fans watched United play Tottenham at Old Trafford. All personal opinions aside, Tottenham is actually a decent side even without their star man Luka Modric. United took Tottenham apart and put three past them. They seem to have found new stars in Tom Cleverly and Danny Welbeck.

Arsenal’s new stars include Gervinho, Emmanuel Frimpong, Carl Jenkinson and Ignasi Miquel. Alex Song is suspended for this match following his red card against Newcastle as is Gervinho. Both players were given three match bans. Frimpong is also suspended following his red card against Liverpool.

Jack Wilshere will not start the match either. Arsenal cannot field the line up they fielded against Udinese due to suspensions. They performed admirably as they came back from a goal down to win 1-2. Song, Frimpong and Gervinho all featured in that match.

Wenger is desperately short of players this weekend. At-least Johan Djourou returns to match-play in the Premier League. Kieran Gibbs will not be back this weekend and according to Wenger will ‘just fall short’ in terms of returning to the squad.

Laurent Koscielny will have a fitness test to see whether he will be able to play on Sunday. Thomas Vermaelen and Tomas Rosicky will be fit to play as well following minor problems during the week.

Arsenal cannot earnestly hope for a win against the holders. Manchester United will smell the weaknesses of this Arsenal team devoid of both Song and Frimpong. Also, Samir Nasri left for Manchester during the week.

Wenger confirmed this week that Nicklas Bendtner will leave this summer and he will be searching for a new striker.

Arsenal drew Olmpique de Marseille and Olympiacos in the Champions League. They would have been happy with the draw. Unfortunately, the German champions, namely Borussia Dortmund emerged from Pot 4 and took their spot in Arsenal’s group. Following the release of the fixtures, Wenger found that his team will have to travel to Germany in their very first fixture.
As far as Manchester United is concerned, they drew Benfica, FC Basel and Otelui Galati.

Things can’t get easier for United; things just can’t get harder for Arsenal.