{"id":995,"date":"2020-06-29T22:08:00","date_gmt":"2020-06-29T21:08:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=995"},"modified":"2020-07-02T16:16:04","modified_gmt":"2020-07-02T15:16:04","slug":"can-arsenal-cane-the-canaries-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=995","title":{"rendered":"Can Arsenal cane the Canaries again?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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(Remember that wondergoal from October 2013? From pinterest)<\/figcaption><\/center><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Norwich City visit the Grove on Wednesday for our first home\nmatch since the Premier League\u2019s restart from Covid-19-induced suspension. The\nreturn to \u2018new-normal\u2019 football has seen us play four successive away games.\nDefeat in the first two games was disappointing and ended all our fantasies\nabout a top five finish.  While the match\nagainst the Mancunian oil-money whores saw a creditable first half performance,\nthe Brighton defeat suggested our players had forgotten their Mikel Arteta\u2019s lessons\nin defensive organisation. However, we come into this game in better fettle\nafter hard fought but deserved victories against Southampton and Sheffield\nUnited.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the other hand, the visitors have played all their games\nsince the restart at home, losing all three with a cumulative score of 1-6. Norwich\nsit rooted to the bottom of the table with 21 points, 6 points adrift of three\nteams on 27 points and with a markedly inferior goal difference of -31. They\nhave won 5, drawn 6 and lost 20 of their 31 league games this season. Norwich\nare adrift but not dead and we can expect them to be fighting hard to preserve their\nPL status, encouraged by a good performance at the weekend in their unlucky cup\nquarter final defeat to the Mancunian also rans in extra time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I had planned to take my good friend Adrian to this match. A\nNorwich lad who has made a mark in London academia and has waited several years\nfor the opportunity to see his first love at the Grove. Sadly, not this year\nand in truth, probably not next year either. The visit of Norwich always brings\nto mind the first match of the 1992-93 season on the opening weekend of the\nPremiership, when they shocked everyone by winning 4-2 at Highbury. They were a\ngood team then under Mike Walker, finishing third that season (their highest\never league position) to secure a UEFA Cup place that saw them go on to beat\nBayern Munich in the Olympic Stadium. That memory of a fine footballing side\nwas trashed by an agricultural performance, by Paul Lambert\u2019s Norwich team who\nkicked us to bits in a 3-3 draw in May 2012. However, Norwich\u2019s football has\nimproved considerably under Daniel Farke (does anyone else think of the Rowan\nand Martin Laugh-In?) whose team won the Championship with style in 2018-19.\nThey have attempted to continue that style in the Premiership, winning admirers\nbut failing to win enough games.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Arsenal have played Norwich City 59 times beginning with a\n5-0 away victory in the FA Cup in January 1952. In all competitions, we have\nwon 28, drawn 20 and lost 11. At our place the record is 18 wins, 8 draws and 4\ndefeats. In the Premiership, our home record is 5 wins, 2 draws and that\nsolitary 1992 defeat. Our last meeting at their place in December was a 2-2\ndraw only 2 days after Freddie had taken temporary charge of a struggling\nArsenal team. Norwich\u2019s goals had the usual hallmarks of the porous Arsenal\ndefence of recent vintage and came from Puki (who was on a goal drought at the\ntime) and Cantwell (reputedly a Gooner). Our two equalisers were both scored by\nAubameyang, the first a penalty, retaken after encroachment to howls of abuse\nand the usual Krull antics; the second a well taken shot from the corner of the\n6-yard box from an \u00d6zil corner. Remember him? We owe the point to a finger-tip,\nfull-stretch save by Leno late in the game from McLean who ran through our\nmidfield and defence unhindered after a Xhaka turnover in our own half. All too\nfamiliar!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Norwich have a competent if somewhat irritating goalkeeper\nin Krull, two much-admired, rampaging young fullbacks in Aarons and Lewis with\nanother promising young English defender in Godfrey. McLean, Buendia and Tettey\nhave been their midfield regulars with 2 goals between them. Puki and Cantwell\nremain Norwich\u2019s main threat with 11 and 7 goals respectively. Hernandez a\nCuban winger, has 2 goals but is not a regular starter and Swiss striker Drmi\u0107\nhas 4 goals from 4 starts and 15 substitute appearances. Expect him to replace\nPuki at some point unless we conspire to revive the Finn\u2019s career again. Centre\nback Klose who received a red card on Saturday won\u2019t be hugely missed as he has\nonly started 4 games all season and I\u2019m not convinced that the extra half hour on\nSaturday will have a major effect on this match as Norwich have had an extra\nday\u2019s rest over the Arsenal players.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I expect Mikel Arteta to make a few changes again. Martinez\nhas been very impressive in goal and will certainly start. I expect a back four\nof Bellerin, Mustafi, Holding and Tierney. Bellerin remains a worry as he is\nstruggling to recapture his pre-ACL form but I suspect Mikel thinks he can play\nhis way back to top form. Mustafi seems a much more reliable player under the\nnew coach, Holding continues to regain match-fitness and recapture his former\nauthority while Tierney is beginning to look the top player we hoped we had\nsigned. Midfield options are limited. I would like to see Willock start after\nhis impressive displays against Brighton and Sheffield United. Xhaka\u2019s\nstabilising influence since the restart has been evident and I expect him to\nstart. The third midfielder would ideally be Saka though he may need a rest,\nand a home game against the bottom team may be the best opportunity to give\n\u00d6zil a chance to show he can still contribute at this level. Ceballos\u2019 late\nwinner on Sunday may just edge him ahead of \u00d6zil as may his more reliable\ndefensive contributions. A critical question is whether Mikel thinks we need to\nhave the option of having 3 at the back when out of possession as we played\nagainst Southampton when Tierney moved in-field to make the three with Saka\nmoving to a wingback role and against Sheffield when Tierney played wingback so\neffectively and Kolasinac played a left-sided centre back role. I suspect Mikel\nwill feel that we shouldn\u2019t need to be that cautious at home against Norwich.\nUp front I expect Mikel to start a steadily improving Pepe on the right and a\nrested Aubameyang on the left. I would start Nketiah at centre forward but I suspect\nLacazette may get the nod in the hope that he\u2019ll rediscover his way to goal at\nhome. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I would very much like to see us keep a clean sheet and\nscore at least two goals but we aren\u2019t very good at the former so I\u2019ll take any\nkind of win. The Holic Pound? I think the value bet on a realistic score is 3-2\nat 25-1.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stay safe Gooners. Go WIN, Arsenal!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(Remember that wondergoal from October 2013? From pinterest) Norwich City visit the Grove on Wednesday for our first home match since the Premier League\u2019s restart from Covid-19-induced suspension. The return to \u2018new-normal\u2019 football has seen us play four successive away games. Defeat in the first two games was disappointing and ended all our fantasies about […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/995"}],"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\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=995"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/995\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1021,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/995\/revisions\/1021"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=995"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=995"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=995"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}