Well GOOD mourning to you all.

You are… mourning, right?

What? You aren’t? But the football was cancelled SPECIFICALLY so you could be sad and think about death things?

Oh… you’re mourning while watching the rugby, cricket and the horses?

You’re seeing the fans in attendance celebrate the life of the Queen and get viral moments all over the internet?

… and you’re wondering why football blew the opp to be the focal point of celebration?

Yeah, me too… what a fucking weird decision to cancel.

Let’s make hay though.

Thomas Partey can be put back into his cryogenic cotton wool chambers for safekeeping.

Ben White and Aaron Ramsdale and inject placenta juice into those fragile hamstrings.

The players can have the weekend off and watch the ruggers.

We can make it work for us.

My irritation is that Spurs had an away game at City after a Champions League game. They get all the luck, that game will probably pop back when they’ve had loads of rest and City have 15 injuries.

Are we going to talk about Spurs consistently dropping terrible performances and getting the wins? You really think they’ll be ok without Harry Kane?

Back to Arsenal…

Still, our next game is against PSV at home, followed by an away game at Brentford. I am no fitness expert, but I suspect the players might be a little underloaded if they don’t get any minutes between now and the Brentford game, so my guess is we might see key names given at least 30 minutes to sharpen them before that massive game.

All we have to do is win that Brentford game and we head into the International break top of the league.

That would be MEGA.

It’s funny that we’re all a little bit whingy despite:

• Winning 7 from 6 games
• Doing that with a Thomas Partey injury
• We’ve scored the 4th most goals
• We’ve have had the 2nd most attempts at goal
• We’ve had the 4th most attempts on target
• We’re number 1 for dribbles per game
• We’re the most fouled team in the league (Spurs and United the least fouled weirdly)
• We concede the 2nd least attempts per game, behind City
• We’re top of the league with the youngest Premier League centre-back, a make-shift right back, and a brand new left-back

That’s a lot of good to be grumbling.

Are there concerns that might have a bit of validity?

We’re conceding silly goals that are less about the system and more about the individual.

We’re doing a lot more in the attacking third, but really, we should be dishing out more batterings. We aren’t as sharp as we should be. Let’s hope that changes as the team gels and get more confident together as the season progresses.

Some bad news that is good… our 3 Gabriel’s have all been snubbed for the Brazil squad that takes on Ghana and Tunisia. I want to be bothered, but having three key names rested over those two weeks is pretty big for us. They won’t be getting exhausted, played on shit pitches, or risked against players that might chop them down.

I suspect at least two of the three will make the World Cup, but Martinelli might struggle this time around. Competition in those attacking positions is outrageous. But, if he wants to change his chances, the best thing to do would be to score 4 goals in every Arsenal game until the end of this phase of the season.

Emile Smith Rowe is back on the bike and SHOULD return fast. My worry with him is that he always seems to be in discomfort. It must be VERY frustrating for him. Hopefully, he can shake that off. I’ll say one thing to him… stay. off. the. Nandos.

Right, quick bit of advice, the best – and I mean THE best way to get over the lack of football today is to put a few pennies down on The Arsenal Opinion Patreon and binge listen. We talk about Royalty, we discuss the culture of meme-ing death, we talk about the new Brazilian wunderkind, and we chat about some of the negatives in our season. Come join the party, our podcast is now consistently a top 3 Arsenal podcast globally, why not pay for some of the special sauce no one else is getting? xxx

PATREON