Ox and Xhaka IN official Arsenal XI for West Ham

The hot topic of the moment for Arsenal fans is how we get back to the fluent football and free scoring style that was so encouraging from the Gunners up until the nasty month of November slowed us down. A lot of people have suggested that the loss of Santi Cazorla to our lengthy injury list has been a big factor so Arsene Wenger and the players must find a way to cope without him.

Many Gooners were hoping that our summer signing Granit Xhaka would be the man to do it but it is fair to say that he has not really done so yet, although some will say that the boss has not given him enough chances, but he has turned to the Swiss international in Santi’s spot today, with Francis Coquelin to protect the back four and both Ramsey and Elneny on the bench.

One of the other decisions the boss had to make was at right back, where he has gone for Gabriel and with Jenkinson not even on the bench as Rob Holding makes the matchday squad instead. Wenger has also stuck with Alexis Sanchez in the centre forward role as Giroud is still out with a knock. He has also opted for Oxlade-Chamberlain over Iwobi and he will be hoping that this team proves that he was right to rest all the big players for the midweek EFL cup loss.

Cech
Gabriel, Mustafi, Koscielny, Monreal
Coquelin, Xhaka
Walcott, Ozil, Oxlade-Chamberlain
Alexis

Subs: Ospina, Gibbs, Holding, Ramsey, Elneny, Iwobi, Lucas.

Can Arsenal start strongly and get a comfortable win over West Ham or are we in for another tough day?

Bob.

Tags Giroud Wenger

75 Comments

  1. With the players that are available, I would say the line-up is spot on from Wenger. I don’t like players out of position (Gabriel at RB), but it’s the right call as Jenkinson has been horrific, and Gabriel did well against Bournemouth. Plenty of pace and movement for Ozil to play with, hopefully he can rediscover his form.

  2. This was my predicted line up now let’s go and get this win! We really need a good win and performance especially for the fans

  3. Neither Xhaka nor Coquelin is particularly good in the box to box role. I’ll have stuck the OX in there TBH

    1. @Twig
      As long as they do a good job recycling the ball up to the front 4, I’m good with the pairing…

  4. best team we could put out .. as bench indicates … and hammers are not the threat they were last year though they are not as bad as their position implies either… all about motivation and effort … should shade it 2 1 but you never know with arsenal2016

  5. I’m curious to see how we could do with 3 at the back until Bellerin returns and use Monreal as a winger with Walcott to track back on their respective flanks.

  6. The game looks easy but we are Arsenal. When the games look easy we start to showboat even before scoring and we will end the game struggling. Any serious team will exploit the weaknesses and score so many goals!

  7. Walcott is beyond sh@@@ … If wenger had understood this 4 years ago might have had a halfway decent attack by now

      1. Arbeloa coming on has been there weak spot. Losing the ball in there third how many times?

        No antonio or Creswell has been big loss for them. No thrust

        Sanchez has.made us a.one team
        Amazing player

        1. Monreal has been allowed to walk like three times already inside the box, but either the final ball is garbage or the other forwards are not there.

          Final ball is missing in our attack. You could see that in the 4 vs 2 attack we had at the end. Slow pass by OX and even worse pass by Özil.

    1. This is the worst and weakest Westham team we will ever play with. For whatever reasons us being Arsenal we dont want easy things. We are not ruthless enough. Should have been 4-0 by now. We know Wenger dosent do anything at half time and we Bilic will do his work!

  8. Walcott should be all over this game. Has made zero far post runs when ox and Monreal has had bundles of space on the left for crosses. Honestly it should be more than 1-0. Hoping we won’t regret missed chances.

    1. Walcott was there lurking when OX decided to take that calamitous shot which ended as a throw in!

  9. Think the commentators will blow if Carroll actually comes on…they’re getting more and more excited

  10. As I expected Westham are now playing better in the 2nd half. Their coach read the game and adjusted their play. Ours said ” you are doing well , lets go” no tactics no what! We are going to struggle I told you yet this is the weakest Westham team we will ever play

      1. I know, no chance at all I was exaggerating. I was being dead serious. Sunderland is vastly superior to us if we take him out the team.

  11. without him …were not in the hunt for f all

    and hes only one that hasnt signed new contract

    please god

  12. 250k is worth it, he our most valuable player, give him what he wants, there no negotiations just give

  13. PAY ANYTHING TO KEEP ALEXIS AND GET RID OF THE LIKES OF THEO, OX AND RAMSEY PLEASE. LEARN FRPOM WORLD CLASS PLAYER

  14. I thought that free kick was going well over…
    So did Petr Cech obviously..

    Ohhhhh great goal Ox!!!

  15. Why is Wenger bringin on Elneny? Just as we get some rhythm, he decides to disrupt it and Elneny is struggling from injury!

  16. Now weve got 33 goals so far this season, one more than chelsea. If only we aren’t shipping too many goals, we would have best goal difference in the league.on the bright side , since the liverpool game debacle we have conceded least goals. KOSTAFI Rules

  17. Payet to arsenal in jan?does that improve our tittle credentials ?may be am wrong ,but I think he would do better than the ox and iwobi

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