I feel like Sanchez is doing everything right apart from delivering a quality final ball but I think it'll come with more games with the players. He got an assist today and his work rate is incredible. He ran everywhere for 90 minutes. It's great to have some pace in the team and someone willing to run at his marker. Debuchy looks to have replaced Sagna with giving the 7/10 performance every game. I know he's 3 games into his Arsenal career but they've all been solid 7s. We'll create many goals from that right side of the pitch once he and Sanchez blend more. I think I'm in love with Chambers. He's extremely solid for a 19 year old CM/RB playing CB. His inexperience showed once or twice today but he's been great.
Arsene Wenger has shown yet more faith in Yaya Sanogo as he takes his good pre season form into the first game of the season. Oliver Giroud has yet to shake off some World Cup rust and will take up his place on the Arsenal bench. The rest of the team is pretty much as expected. New flier Alexis Sanchez starts in the Walcott position while Santi keeps his place on the left ahead of the likes of Oxlade-Chamberlain.
The often maligned Frenchman has a chance to show what he can do with a compliment of players around him that he simply did not have enough of last season. An isolated Giroud is a different Giroud to the one who has players to combine with and with Alexis added and hopefully Theo returning to add to the lung bursting runs of Ramsey, this could be a big season for the handsome Frenchman. But before any of that he needs to shine and surpass a hungry and confident Yaya Sanogo.
Oliver Giroud was short of match fitness and looked behind the pace so Yaya Sanogo was given the chance in the Community Shield but unless you've been pacing around London Colny then you are not going to know if anything has changed in that regard. A few training sessions with Giroud looking sharp and flicking passes through to Alexis might change the managers mind but at the same time Sanogo might have been going from strength to strength after having a full pre season. This game is unlikely to be the walk over that some are predicting though. When we faced Crystal Palace for the first time last season, Ian Holloway had just walked away from the job *Deja Vu* and in came Keith Millen. Holloway's team was very leaky just as his Premier League Blackpool team was but the temporary manager came in and binned the old approach, instead adopting a far more cautious approach.
This summer it looks as if Arsène's dealings in the transfer window has been planned with our approach very much in mind. Alexis Sanchez is naturally a speedy work horse. A player that does not allow the opposition to settle. A little like a faster Tevez in that aspect and I just loved the balance that both Ramsey and Wilshere gave us just ahead of Arteta. It gives the team a lovely balance, especially when it comes to winning the ball back. In many ways I'd really love to see that develop over a longer period but when you have Mesut Özil available for selection you simply have to squeeze him in and that will be at the expense of someone else in midfield and I just don't see Özil used as a box to box midfielder, that simply isn't his game
The only problem here is Chambers' age and the notion that Arsenal, contending seriously for a league title for the first time in a nervy, frustrating decade, can't risk one point here, two points there, in the league table to the learning curve of a 19-year old center back, much less when we've already got an excellent first choice pairing in that position for the first time in years. At 19 years a center half has only experienced a relatively small number of game situations at full speed with the first team in which to hone those critical instincts that have him feeling rather than thinking his way through a match. Better, the thinking goes, to entrust that critical backup role to an old head.
Leadership is something that Mertesacker has become renowned for, so much so that he was most Arsenal fans’ pick to become the new captain following Vermaelen’s departure to Barcelona. Alas, Per will have to settle for vice and Arteta was duly given the armband. Returning to my point, there is no doubt that Mertesacker’s leadership qualities and organisational skills are mainly down to experience, and experience is something that Chambers currently lacks. Despite this, Calum still demonstrates the assertiveness and awareness of an organiser and, quite rightly, doesn’t let his age or short time spent at the club stop him barking orders to teammates. His time as captain of England’s U19s side has certainly helped in that respect. Eventually, I can see Chamber’s maturing into a very competent and intelligent defensive leader.
When was the last time you saw Jack Wilshere looking as clean and tidy as that? It was still only a friendly so we need to see him in the Premier League but he looked very sharp and fit. Is it even worth talking about Aaron Ramsey? nothing new really, just another top quality display from a top quality player. His goal for me was the highlight of the day. Yaya Sanogo's pass to him was slightly behind him but Ramsey with a player in front of him scooped the ball over the defenders foot to make room for the shot across the keeper and into the net. His conversion rate much be through the roof because the FA Cup final aside, I cannot remember many games where Ramsey has missed a host of chances before finally scoring one. It seems like he tucks away his first chances these days.
In my match preview I put up two line ups, one was the team I hoped Arsene would choose and the other the one I expected Arsene to choose. Needless to say he didn't go with my team but all the same his selection is still very strong. Yaya Sanogo leads the line for Arsenal this afternoon while Alexis Sanchez starts from the right.