Previews

Put another way, they have won only once at home in the league since the end of November. A 1-0 victory over West Brom, so that form along with all the off pitch issues has risen the expectancy levels up somewhat. The good news for Arsenal is that they are missing a very key component in the heart of their central defence. Centre back Dejan Lovren is out through injury so is Gaston Ramirez. Dani Osvaldo has been suspended for headbutting his team mate in training which is very kind of him but they do have Victor Wanyama coming back into the squad for the first time in weeks as he overcomes an injury of his own. Victor was allowed to kick as many Arsenal players as humanly possible in that first game so I'm interested to see how the referee handles him this time round.

Gedion Zelalem missed the League cup run due to injury and is said to feature at some point tonight. There was an awful lot of hype on him during the pre season. I certainly put my two cents in. But his injury has made him practically disappear off the radar. Not a bad thing I guess given his

The Cottagers have been in a right mess this season. In recent weeks they have been hit for 4 by Liverpool, 4 from Everton and 6 against Hull City. Can we have one of those please? We haven't won by a larger margin than 2 clear goals since November 30th when we beat Cardiff City 3-0. Even then you have to go back all the way to October 19th when we scored 4 against Norwich. While we have been dominant in many of our games we have rarely had the chance to put on our comfy slippers and slurp on some hot chocolate. Instead having to knock back Whiskey shots to control our nerves like during the final stages at Villa Park on Monday or recently at St James' Park. If we start the game as we did in games like Tottenham in the FA cup then we should have a good chance to score early. Fulham have conceded the most goals this season with 46. That is 27 more than us in 21 games which is quite remarkable really.

There is a rather uncanny symmetry happening in regards to Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain. AOC had impressed during the pre season and was taking similar steps forward to Aaron Ramsey. On the first day of the season Chamberlain had already chalked up an assist to his name before suffering from a knee injury that would write off the first half of his season. He returns tonight against the last

We got the better of them in this fixture in the beginning of the season but the situation was very different. Tottenham boasting half a new squad of players were supposed to show everyone about the 2013 version of the powershift. Arsenal without any new players aside from Flamini were uner big pressure after an opening day defeat to Villa but Giroud flicked in a Theo Walcott cross that won us the three points. Today we are top of the league and Tottenham have gone through yet another management change. But while perceptions on the two teams have changed, Tottenham's new boss and Arsenal supporter, Tim Sherwood has started very well aside from a league cup home defeat to West Ham.

If Bendtner does start what of Lukas Podolski? If he plays wide left then who will Arsene play on the right. We know that Arsene avoids playing three direct attackers due to team balance but is that purely defensive balance or creative balance? If only the former then a deep duo of Arteta and

One player who will not feature is Aaron Ramsey who suffered a knee problem in the West Ham game, offsetting that issue will be the return of Jack Wilshere from injury. The two game break could have done Jack some good as his form had dipped somewhat. Would it be a risk to throw Wilshere into a difficult away match after a two week break? Newcastle United are in very good form and will

You would imagine that Theo Walcott will keep his place in the team for the next few weeks due to his freshness and obvious goal scoring threat even if he was not at his best against Chelsea. Santi Cazorla is likely to start on the left so Tomas Rosicky could keep his place in the team, probably replacing Özil as our furthest attacking player. Even without our record signing, that is a very strong

I fully expect Chelsea to revert back to type tonight, they have been conceding goals and Mourinho will not want to concede goals tonight. I wouldn't be surprised to see Chelsea lay out the same trap that they have done for many years now. Stop us from playing, invite us onto them and hit us on the break or from a set piece. It has been groundhog day against Mourinho but hopefully we have to show that we are now much smarter than that. I would much rather see a boring chess match between two heavyweight teams canceling each other out than another game of Arsenal having all the ball and lose.

I would like to see both Özil and Ramsey rested for this for differing reasons. A fresh Ramsey would have been ideal for this given the insane amount of tackles he makes during the course of 90 minutes but he looked below par against Everton and has played more than most. Özil on the other hand looks like he could play another midweek and then weekend but I think we should start a midfield who are all natural at tracking a man and putting a foot in. If we need to score as the game goes on then he wouldn't be a bad sub would he. In the team that I have selected above, all those players like a tackle, will track back yet have the footballing quality to hurt Napoli.