{"id":9392,"date":"2024-04-05T08:00:09","date_gmt":"2024-04-05T07:00:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=9392"},"modified":"2024-04-07T11:33:08","modified_gmt":"2024-04-07T10:33:08","slug":"are-the-shadows-of-albion-stirring","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=9392","title":{"rendered":"Are the shadows of Albion stirring?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"getty embed image\" style=\"background-color:#fff;display:inline-block;font-family:Roboto,sans-serif;color:#a7a7a7;font-size:11px;width:100%;max-width:594px;\"><div style=\"padding:0;margin:0;text-align:left;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/2137429564\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color:#a7a7a7;text-decoration:none;font-weight:normal !important;border:none;display:inline-block;\" rel=\"noopener\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><\/div><div style=\"overflow:hidden;position:relative;height:0;padding:61.78451% 0 0 0;width:100%;\"><iframe src=\"\/\/embed.gettyimages.com\/embed\/2137429564?et=m0PqxdXAQNhmeKvE2LHK3Q&amp;tld=com&amp;sig=8Ocjua4UaeHkcB6anHMv5aTehtBbkdYC0u3Qr-ggQpg=&amp;caption=true&amp;ver=1\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" width=\"594\" height=\"367\" style=\"display:inline-block;position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;margin:0;\"><\/iframe><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>Arsenal travel down to the South coast of England on Saturday to take on Brighton and Hove&#8217;s Seagulls in an early-evening tilt at the Falmer Stadium.  We&#8217;re coming off our workmanlike 2-0 win over Luton this midweek, after Sunday&#8217;s chess match at Al-Citeh&#8217;s oil-slick dump.  Brighton drew with Brentford this week, having lost to Liverpool 2-1 over the weekend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We come in on a better run of form, where in addition to advancing to the final 16 of the Champions League we are undefeated in the Premier League in 2024.  The Albion defeated Sheffield United mid-February 5-0, having won or drawn a string of games where they were scoring for fun, but since that win at the Blades they&#8217;ve fallen out of the Europa League to Roma, and are struggling for goals while being somewhat porous at the back.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Nonetheless, the portents are dark and veiled, for Brighton have been difficult for Arsenal to beat over the past few years.  In 8 games across all competitions Arsenal have won 4, lost 3, and drawn 1, the latest Premier League game in December ending 2-0 to the Arsenal.  Naturally, as this is the second game of an April where we play just about every three days, this game can be considered something straight out of the Velvet Underground (&amp; Nico).  We need to tread carefully&#8230;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Brighton and Hove<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Roberto de Zerbi&#8217;s team is certainly going to be missing some key players.  Danger man Mitoma is out for the season with a lower back injury, and Hinshelwood, Gilmour, and March are out for the foreseeable future.  Milner is struggling with a thigh injury, and Ferguson has an ankle knock; the latter is likely to play, but probably start on the bench.  We may see one of Enciso or Pedro, both of whom are working their way back to fitness after injury.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Expect them to line up in a 4-2-3-1, with Gro\u00df and Baleba shielding a back four with Dunk and van Hecke flanked by Lamptey and Estupi\u00f1\u00e1n; the latter pair like to move up in support of a front four that includes ex-Arsenal man Welbeck and the not-so-subtly-hated Lallana.  Dunk gives the defense both height and solidity (not to say grit, but not NOT to say it), and keeper Verbruggen is solid, if unable to keep many clean sheets this season (and those have come against Forest, Brentford, and Sheffield&#8230;so&#8230;).  They will really miss Enciso (should he not play) and especially Mitoma; both are integral to Brighton&#8217;s success, but their lack of goals coincides exactly with the period since Mitoma went out after the Sheffield League game.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>The Arsenal<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As noted, our form coming into the game is very good, though not quite as scintillating as it was prior to the interlull.  Our defeat of a decent Luton squad was professional and somewhat restful ahead of our busy April.  We were able to rest Saka completely; Rice got a quarter-game off the bench, and Martinelli had a stretch of his legs after being out for three weeks with his injured ankle.  As TTG discussed in his report, MOTM Smith Rowe, Partey, and Nelson were given starts, thus time to sharpen what might otherwise be dull legs after being out through injury or omission these past months.  We&#8217;re in good shape, actually (knock on wood), with Saka being probable for the game and Timber being our only absentee at the moment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I do believe this will be another good game to give some of the players hovering around the red zone some rest.  A bench with Ramsdale, Saka, \u00d8degaard, Rice, and White (among others) could lead to a starting lineup that looks something like this:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">Raya<br>Tomiyasu &#8212; Saliba &#8212; Gabriel &#8212; Kiwior<br>Partey &#8212; Vieira &#8212; ESR<br>Jes\u00fas &#8212; Havertz &#8212; Martinelli<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Chancy, I know, but it gives us solidity defensively across the back without sacrificing too much ahead of it, and gives another solid rest for those who really need it.  The only real doubt I have about this lineup is Vieira in the middle; he&#8217;s not really close enough to captain M\u00f8 to replace him, but perhaps this is the game to try.  If we&#8217;re playing with too much Portuguese descanso by early in the second half we can bring in the captain and move with our usual Nordic elan to win the game.  Alternatively we could start ESR in the controlling midfield role alongside Jorghino and Partey, but that could tend towards the mildly defensive in a game where we really should be able to get at them.  It&#8217;s also a game where Nwaneri could take a bow; he looked good coming on as a late sub during February&#8217;s 6-0 demolition of Wet Spam, and according to MA8 he&#8217;s pushing for first team action after signing his first professional contract.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>The Holic pound<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>While I won&#8217;t be betting on this game, preferring rather to send that money to World Central Kitchen in support of their grief over losing 7 aid workers this week.  However, if you wish, you can get 14s on a 3-0 Arsenal victory.  Add another Arsenal goal and you can nearly double that, at 27\/1; add two Brighton goals to that and you are at 40\/1.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I&#8217;ll assume Countryman100 and C100Jr will be heading South on Saturday.  For them, and for all who are making the trek, bon voyage, good voice, and may a fair, winning wind guide you back to North London after the game.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Embed from Getty Images Arsenal travel down to the South coast of England on Saturday to take on Brighton and Hove&#8217;s Seagulls in an early-evening tilt at the Falmer Stadium. We&#8217;re coming off our workmanlike 2-0 win over Luton this midweek, after Sunday&#8217;s chess match at Al-Citeh&#8217;s oil-slick dump. Brighton drew with Brentford this week, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9392"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9392"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9392\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9413,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9392\/revisions\/9413"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9392"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}