We will not know the official starting line-up of Arsenal until about an hour before the kick-off against Red Star Belgrade in the third of our Europa League group games this evening, but I think we can be fairly sure that the name of Jack Wilshere will be in there.
With the England international midfield star being the player chosen by Arsene Wenger to do the pre-match press conference ahead of the game, it looks like Jack is going to be handed a start. He will surely be raring to go after missing out on a rare Premier League appearance last Saturday when Koscielny had to be replaced as Wilshere was set to come on as the third sub at Watford.
The 25-year old has another reason to be fired up for this match as well, because he has not taken well to the criticism and comments about Arsenal supposed lack of ‘cojones’ from Troy Deeney. As reported by The Mirror, Wilshere has defended his team mates and insisted that there is no lack of character in the Gunners dressing room.
He said, “Nobody can question our character.
Watford skipper Troy Deeney slammed the Gunners after Saturday’s come-from-behind 2-1 win over Arsene Wenger’s men, accusing them of lacking “cojones”.
“As a player, if your attitude is questioned, it’s horrible. I look around this team and you can’t question our character.
“People try to put us down, they always have. I don’t think the comments were justified.
“When we look back at the game we look back at ourselves and what we did wrong. I don’t think we can look back and question our character. We did certain things wrong, but we certainly didn’t want to let the lead slip.
“We will move on.
“We have a game against Red Star Belgrade and another big game at the weekend [away to Everton] and we have seen with this team that the players can bounce back quickly and we will do that.
“I am sure individually players are disappointed – no one wants to hear those comments. But players are entitled to their opinions and to talk.
“That’s part of the modern-day game and we have to deal with that. All we can do is bounce back with a good performance tomorrow and at the weekend.”
Jack has already seen red this season for scrapping on the pitch with the under 23 Arsenal team so hopefully his desire to show fight will not go too far but he has clearly been riled by Deeney’s words, as has his manager. Arsene Wenger also alluded to the comments in his interview reported by Metro when asked if the Watford striker’s words had hurt.
He said, “Yes but I know who my players really are. In the last seven games we had six wins and one draw.
‘Comments are part of the modern game. I love my players and I trust their strength of character to respond.”
So will Wenger pick a strong side and will the likes of Wilshere justify it by proving the Arsenal doubters wrong against Red Star Belgrade?
Bob.
Thinking sky doing s..t, over and over again ! oh god..help Arsene to deliver something solid to FANS….
Wilshere might do something …. IF he is picked to play !
One match against RSB wont silence critics.
We are winless in away PL matches. We need to win tonight AND beat Everton away to subdue critics temporarily.
The only away match we won was against Bate in Europa. 8 premier league matches in and no win away is quite bad. We did have a really good draw away to Chelsea but lost big to Liverpool, lost to Stoke and Watford. Not beating Everton will be especially bad as they have been far less than impressive themselves
So concentrate tonight on a win. Actually, winning tonight will put us through so will help other competitions. But after that we must beat Everton. I don’t want us to go 5 matches without a win
They’ll silence them for all of 5 minutes
Same old story mess up big time and then do the kisses and make up thing and then……………. Mess up again. My head is spinning off the circles the club is moving in. I guess Wenger and the club were wrong in choosing stability over progress, yeah! We are stable alright, nice stable platform for other teams to leap off in ascension.
Hopefully Jack plays tonight and I’ve also heard Cech will play in goal. We need Reece more forward than wing back and seems Debuchy will also start. Forget the foreign word for it, we need balls tonight, big balls!
Sorry I think it’s Reisse or Rhyse and not Reece (Nelson).
Team announced on bbc and sky.
C’mon Just Arsenal!
Dortmund and Athletico look likely to be in the next round of the europa league so we wont win that either. Especially as its after January when Alexis and Ozil will be sold, dont be suprised when we try and recoupe the £60 million we lost by not selling Alexis in the summer by selling them both in January. Once you take them two out the side it really is troubling as I expect Giroud will leave sooner rather than later leaving us with Walcott and Laca to get the goals. A huge overhaul is needed every player in our team at the moment has more con’s than pro’s and its easy to name better players in every position even from clubs below us. Players who arent good enough for a title challenging first 11 Bellerin, Monreal at cb, Holding, Mertersacker, Ramsey, Xhaka, El Neny, Walcott, Iwobi(i do rate just not a first teamer yet would he play at city/united/chelsea?),Giroud, Welbeck, these players get regular game time at Arsenal this is a major issue, couped with the fact Mustafi Ozil Sanchez all want to leave Cech isnt getting any younger Kos is now injury prone this doesnt make good reading. So not including any major signings the players we have 2 players of high standards Sead and Lacazetti I would include Wilshere but he needs to reprove himself and also Le Coq who had one and half amazing seasons has half a bad one and gets dropped for Xhaka who hasnt even had 5 good games.
Arsenal fans, please stop being so negative. After the game, what are you going to say? I mean after Arsenal win