Quantcast
Home   >   Opinions   >   [Image] Young trio start, Partey & Gabriel out – How Arsenal should line-up vs Molde

[Image] Young trio start, Partey & Gabriel out – How Arsenal should line-up vs Molde

By on November 5, 2020

joe willock arsenal

Arsenal take on Molde at the Emirates this evening in our third Europa League group stage game. This is the team I’d like to see Mikel Arteta select for the game…

Alex Runarsson enjoyed the easiest of debuts during the win over Dundalk last week and I think he should get another run-out tonight with Bernd Leno rested ahead of the Aston Villa game.

Hopefully Arteta goes with a back four as there is no need to play with three centre-backs at home to Molde. David Luiz is back in contention after recovering from a thigh injury so I’d start him alongside Shkodran Mustafi with Gabriel and Rob Holding rested.

Calum Chambers and Pablo Mari are still working their way back to full fitness while Sokratis and William Saliba aren’t eligible so Arteta should protect Gabriel and Holding after their excellent displays at Old Trafford.

Arsenal should also rest Kieran Tierney and Hector Bellerin so Sead Kolasinac can come in at left-back with Cedric Soares or Ainsley Maitland-Niles given a start at right-back.

Thomas Partey should obviously be rested for the Villa game after his sensational performance against Man Utd and no doubt he’s going to be a key player for Arsenal over the coming years.

Mohamed Elneny produced a surprisingly good display at United so it will be interesting to see if he keeps his place for the Premier League game on Sunday. Granit Xhaka is likely to start tonight alongside Dani Ceballos after they both missed out at the weekend.

I’d like to see Arsenal play more of a 4-2-3-1 formation and Joe Willock deserves to start after his impressive performance against Dundalk while Reiss Nelson should also come back into the side as he was one of our better players last time out in the Europa League.

Nicolas Pepe can start in attack after being overlooked against Man Utd so Willian and Bukayo Saka can get a rest along with captain Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.

Alexandre Lacazette is going through a tough time right now so maybe it’s best he’s taken out the lime-light tonight with Eddie Nketiah given another chance to impress up front for Arsenal.

This would be my Arsenal XI:

football formations