Mikel Arteta made several changes to his team for Arsenal’s match against Luton Town this evening.
Arsenal remains in the Champions League and is engaged in a serious title race alongside Liverpool and Manchester City.
Arteta risks burning out his top players if he continues to field them in every fixture and decided to rest some for the game against Luton.
It was a fixture that Arsenal had to win, but Arteta still opted to rest the likes of Declan Rice and Gabriel Jesus from the start.
Players such as Emile Smith Rowe and Reiss Nelson were given the chance to shine, and they seized the opportunity.
Arsenal returned to the top without jeopardising their key players, and Arteta is pleased with the performance.
Speaking after the game, he said, as quoted by the BBC:
“We managed to rotate and freshen the team up a bit. Those who came in did really, really well.
“To have a squad they have to play. We have to make those decisions. The contribution they make to the team was very good.
“Now we recover and go again because we have Brighton away.”
Just Arsenal Opinion
It is great to see that we can win games even if we rest some of our most important players, which shows everyone in the team is mentally ready to contribute to our success this term.
Rice and Jorginho have been doing a great job, but mehn partey is a joy to watch
A fit Thomas Partey has to be integrated back into the starting 11 as soon as possible, because he allows Declan Rice and Martin Odegaard to move further forward and better utilise their attacking prowess.
ESR and Reiss Nelson hopefully have given Arteta more confidence to give them more playing time. Arsenal needs a strong squad with games every three days.
With the world class player back, the Ghanaian will be like a new signing instantly thrown on the battle field.
His comeback can hardly be at a better time, Arsenal will need such world class talent to ensure our progression in the champions league.
Believe it or not,Thomas Partey is our best option at the heart of midfield, an important job that no one can pull off quite like he can.
Although much is made about our lack of ball progression against the Citizens, it has largely owed to the world class player absence from the base of midfield, The Ghanaian excels when receiving the ball from the back line on the half turn , being careful to resist suffocating opposition pressure.
The return of the world class player to the base of the midfield, would no doubt enable Rice to shift into a left # 8 slot hence freeing up the Big German in best position leading the front line.
To me, some of the Arsenal’s rotation team match starters, who Arteta fielded out against Luton. were largely disappoint in their overall performance in the match for Arsenal. i have to say.
In particular are the Gunners of Reiss Nelson, Leandro Trossard, Olek’ Zinchenko who all started the match. And even Eddie Nkethia who was brought on for the match. But they all didn’t make any meaningful impact in the match for Arsenal.
For, I had in my expectation expected to see Nelson score in the match for Arsenal. So too are Trossard and Nkethia when he was introduced into the match to all score. But the trio Gunners didn’t.
Neither did they and Zinchenko assisted to score in the match for Arsenal. Which if they had scored or provided assists. The Gunners would have wallop Luton 5-0 at fulltime of the match. But which didn’t happen.
But since football is said that it is not mathematics. And a win is a win. I have taken and accepted the 2-0 match win that the Gunners had beaten Luton with. Which has now seen them reclaimed top spot of the league from the Reds of Liverpool.
Sadly, Saliba and Gabriel have played almost every minute since January and there is no rest for them. If only we had reliable defenders to rotate with them. Arteta could have used Cedric in place of White and Tomiyasu in place of Saliba/Gabriel but he chose not to.