All eyes on Brentford (but not really)

Good morning from a beautifully sunny and warm London.

Arsenal take on Brentford later this afternoon, and much like last weekend against Everton, I feel like today’s team selection will be informed by what we have to do in midweek against Real Madrid. In typical fashion, Mikel Arteta spoke about how the job at hand was to take three points today, and when asked how he brings his players back down to earth from the high of Tuesday’s result and performance, he said:

It’s not about bringing them back. It’s now maintaining that energy and that momentum and using it towards Brentford and the very difficult game that we’re going to face against a team that, when you look at what they’ve done, it’s just incredible.

We play every three days and in different competitions. The biggest stage is playing in Europe, and then we come back to the Premier League and have a completely different game, completely different opposition and context around the game. If you want to become a team that can win in any of those, you have to do it every three days, regardless of what the scenario is.

I can definitely envisage some changes to the side today. It wouldn’t surprise me at all to see Ben White, Jorginho, Kieran Tierney, Ethan Nwaneri, Oleksandr Zinchenko and Leandro Trossard all come into the team. Perhaps even Raheem Sterling too. Which, I think it’s fair to say isn’t as strong as we could go, but we still have a job to do in Madrid next week so resting some players from the start, and perhaps introducing them if we have work to do to win the game seems like the way to go.

Arteta didn’t specify how much he would rotate, but hinted at it, saying:

We’ll look now at how the players have recovered because it’s not only about this game, it’s about the schedule that we have in the next few weeks as well. Whoever plays will be very competitive.

As for Brentford, we know what a good side they are, and they have made life difficult for us in the past. They’ll arrive today knowing Arsenal will be on a high after beating Real Madrid, but also likely to face a weaker side than normal with the potential distraction of that trip to Spain as something they could take advantage of.

So, it’s unlikely to be a classic but hopefully one that we can still take three points from. Momentum is a real thing, and while everyone’s obviously more invested in the Champions League at this point, I hope we’ll see a decent game and an Arsenal win. Not least because I’m going be there!

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Elsewhere, the Premier League is introducing semi-automated offside technology this weekend, having initially said it would be rolled out much earlier in the season. The announcement says, “Semi-automated offside technology will provide more efficient placement of the virtual offside line, based on optical player tracking, and produce virtual graphics to ensure an enhanced in-stadium and broadcast experience for supporters.

“The operation of semi-automated offside technology does not change the accuracy of the decision-making but enhances the speed, efficiency and consistency of the process.”

I have to say I have some reservations about this. They talk a good game, but as PGMOL and VAR have demonstrated over the years, despite the best of intentions, they have managed to make a mess of things in ways nobody thought was possible, and just when you thought you’d seen it all, they do something even worse. So, I’m not putting it past them to cause some kind of controversy with this in a way nobody can imagine.

Beyond that however, I question the timing of it. It it right to implement new technology with just seven games left to go of the season? Maybe it’ll make no difference, but to have 31 games officiated the same way, then 7 differently just doesn’t seem right to me. At this point, could they not have just waited until next season? Let’s see how it goes, I suppose.

Right, I’m gonna leave it there. As ever, you can follow the game on the live blog later, and we’ll have the post-match stuff on Arseblog News too. There’s a preview podcast waiting for your ears on Patreon too.

Catch some of you later!