Most of the Arsenal players are preparing for Unai Emery’s first season, although Danny Welbeck will be the last to return having played a gruelling 11 minutes at the World Cup Finals. The friendlies have begun with the 8-0 drubbing of Boreham Wood which saw Sokratis and Guendouzi make their debuts, swiftly followed by the unpublicised 9-0 win over Crawley Town in which Bernd Leno kept his first clean sheet for the Gunners.
These were gentle warm-ups for the serious stuff, after flying to Singapore this Sunday we start against Atletico Madrid on Thursday, July 26 and follow that up against Emery’s old club Paris Saint-Germain on Saturday, July 28 at the same ground. These two games are part of the yearly International Champions Cup.
After that we are off to Dublin to play against Chelsea. Last years Champions have been in turmoil last season, but Abramovich has now appointed Sarri to take over from Conte but he hasn’t had much time to get to know his players yet. We get to play them in the Aviva Stadium, on Wednesday, August 1, with a kick-off at 8.05pm (UK time). This is also part of the International Champions Cup, and will be swiftly followed by a pre-season friendly in Stockholm on Saturday, August 4, where we will play Lazio rather than Sevilla who have had to pull out for unknown reasons.
That will be our last publicized game until we face the Champions Man City in Emery’s first official game as Arsenal boss, and I for one cannot wait to see our new line-up in action.
Come on you Gooners!!!
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