Dan’s EPL Predictions Week 8 – Arsenal to keep run going

Dan’s EPL Predictions

Brighton 1-2 Spurs
The last thing you want when you have conceded 7 goals at home is a tricky away game early on Saturday afternoon. Brighton should go for the throat, wasn’t that the point of replacing Chris Hughton with Graham Potter? I sense they won’t..

Burnley 2-0 Everton
If Everton lose here, I think Silva might spend the next two weeks sweating. I read a statistic this week that Silva is yet to win a game when the Toffees conceded first. To me, that statistic sums them up. You look on the pitch/touchline and you’re not filled with hope, they look nervous. You need character to win at Burnley, I’m not sure the visitors have that.

Liverpool 2-2 Leicester
Strange thing to say for a side who have a 100 percent record In the Prem so far, but they might have to play better than they have been to win this game. By the law of averages they are due luck to go against them for a change.

Norwich 2-2 Villa
Could be a surprisingly great game. Both sides who will see this as winnable. Both managers will go for it. Yet both have a way of shooting themselves in the foot.

West Ham 1-0 Palace
Always think the Hammers don’t like it when they are favourites. Their fans show up with certain entitlement, meaning it doesn’t take them long for them to turn on their own. I’ll go for a home win as you never know how positive Palace will be away from home. Fabianski is a huge loss but they should be okay here.

Watford 2-2 Sheffield United
A nightmare game for the Hornets. It’s a newly promoted side arriving so fans will view this as winnable, yet it’s a promoted side who are more confident than the home side. A moment of quality might rescue a point.

Arsenal 3-2 Cherries
I back us most of the time at the Emirates. Don’t get me wrong Bournemouth have the talent to hurt our defence but how they play, plays into our hands. They are too nice, and ‘you play we play’ suits us..

Saints 1-2 Chelsea
As a young team Chelsea will be very confidence-driven players, up and downs. A win in Lille will have them feeling good, and the longer they work with Frank the more they will adapt to his style. It pains me to say, they are good to watch. Saints are much too negative to get a result.

Man City 2-0 Wolves
Wolves’ late winner in Europe is huge for their season as it gives them something to dream for. It will lift their spirits and might make them more stubborn but eventually the Champions will break them down. In terms of the Silva Mendy post, I don’t think he meant anything mean-spirited, but your mate not being offended can’t be an excuse for racism. You put content on social media, then the public have a right to comment. In 2019, with racism increasing, we need to educate the next generation that there is zero tolerance against racism. Once you make excuses, it’s not zero tolerance.

Newcastle 0-2 United
It’s all good Steve Bruce making wholesale changes to make a point, but if he isn’t replacing them with quality what’s the point? It’s horrible when your fans are showing up assuming the worst. There not even angry just sad. If United score early the stadium will go quiet. If it were any other owner, the manager would then go into the international break fearing for his job, but not under Mike Ashley.

Dan Smith

29 Comments

  1. Admin can you unpin that official team for standard liege match article. Blocking new articles when on mobile.

  2. If we continue playing Torreira/Guendouzi, Ceballos, Wilock we should be fine

    Defensively use Bellerin, Tierney, Holding, Luiz/Chambers

    BENCH, play League Cup/Family Cup or Only use these players during emergency: Xhaka, Niles, Mustafi, Sokratis, Ozil

    I was hoping Lacazette would come back soon to give Aubameyang some rest but it seems Martinelli could do the job until he comes back. Msrtinelli has been great so far

    I see us beating Bournemouth, hopefully

  3. Liverpool have been ridiculously lucky and don’t deserve 21 pts at all. Second best in many matches yet they win but their fans don’t whine unlike ours. Remove their luck and it is a close title fight right now, only 4 pts behind city despite Playing 3 top teams already.

    1. Ackshay, it’s refs too, Liv get the rub of the green because without it city would romp home each season. Liv it was shown commit roughly the same amount of fouls as others on average (I’d say it’s more fouls as the stats are only the ones given) but they receive much less cards. Those cards would put some of Liv’s best ball winners out of matches but they allow Liv to play that game just like Stoke was allowed to play a certain game, if Liv keep runna ing and trying to come through the back of a player they should be warned about it, you can’t tackle from behind but they climb all over players trying to pressure them into a bad ball. The pundits and the refs treat that team differently to how ourselves or Chelsea or Tott or even city are treated, it was the same story when Leicester came up from nowhere, they had a helping hand.

  4. And what a sight that would be, to see luck go against Liverpool!! Come on Vardy!
    As always, I hope Liverpool, Spuds, Chelsea & United lose… as well as us & City winning!

    1. Hi Sue, hope you enjoyed last nights game as much as I did. Martinelli is going to be a real star.
      Did you see what your old 🔥 Podolski said? He reckons Gnabry should be made Arsenal’s player of the month for scoring 4 goals against spurs 🤣

  5. Man City and Liverpool wins.
    All the other games could swing any which way.
    There are now 9 teams competing for places 3-6.
    Arsenal Chelsea Spurs United Leicester Westham Bournemouth Burnley and Sheff Utd.
    We need Liverpool to beat Leicester and allow us to go third when we win.
    We are at home. So we simply must win.
    I doubt Bellerin or Tierney will start.
    Better to give then the two week international break to rest.
    I would be so mad if either got injured on international duty.

    Leno
    Chambers Socritis Luiz Kolasinac
    Xhaka Guendouzi.
    Pepe Ceballos Saka
    Aubameyang .
    Subs
    Martinez AMN Tierney Holding Nelson Willock Martinelli

  6. Off Topic:

    I’ve made an observation , on here and on other arsenal platforms , but I think it’s better suited to the comments section not a full article .It’s about Nicholas Pepe’s playing style.

    Here,arseblog,AFTV, people have been asking why he’s always looking to dribble , some even blaming emery for putting him in a position where he has to drop deeper to pick posession and have to dribble.
    Let’s start with what bought Pepe a name around Europe, before all his goals and assists , Pepe was making a name because he was the most fouled player in Europe half way through last season. Almost like Lionel Messi , Neymar or Jadon Sancho ,he is one of those wingers who could more appropriately be referred to as wide forwards . He is less likely to whip a cross in , and more likely to tip toe his way into the box and steal a shot or make a cut back , or win a penalty . Now a few of you will respond by saying you want your winger to run into space and whip in a cross .well guess what? Opposition defenders actually wish you would do that . for two reasons .
    1.They know they can exert enough pressure 9/10 times to ensure your cross is inaccurate.
    2.They know they can exert enough pressure 9/10 times to ensure that no body makes proper contact with your cross in the box .

    Of late , when people talk about crosses , everybody wants to run and use Liverpool as proof that they work .Fact of the matter is ,very few Liverpool crosses actually hit a red shirt in the box. Most of them come from one flank ,all the way to the other , then a goal is scored when the ball is returned into the mixer . and mind you , this is done by the fullbacks and not the wide forwards . The wide forwards depend on their dribbling ability and making space for each other.

    Personally , I’d rather Pepe doesn’t even try to change how he plays. Once his touch and confidence returns , his feigns and fakes and shimmies will begin to come off . He has done this before and he can do it again.

    I particularly liked that bit yesterday when he did a double touch in the Standard Liege box and took a tumble . Every now and then , you need a player in your team that will get you out of tight situations with a little ingenuity like that. If he goes down and wins a few penalties , defenders will stop wanting to go near him ,lest they commit a foul . which will open up more space for him.

    A tricky player can cause a lot of problems for defenders . take an instance , how Xhaka took out Son in the London derby . Everybody will find you a picture of Xhaka with his boot on Son ,because it sells the Xhaka is incompetent banner better . But look at the video , and you’ll notice there was a little shimmy from Son that convinced Xhaka he was going to shoot . And Pepe is one of those players that can make such things happen in our favor so other teams can blame their players too . thanks for reading , cheers

    1. Nope, Xhaka is incompetent. Did BHA’s Solly March show Xhaka a little shimmy when he senseless pulled him down last season for a needless and detrimental penalty well away from any danger? If Pepe is skilled great, but if winning penalties is why he cost £72M then am afraid we were scammed. Cancel the contract to buy right now if possible and Lille can keep the downpayment

      1. Let’s say you’re right. If that guy xhaka took down had gone through and scored, (the fact that it was a penalty is enough proof he was in a dangerous position) what would you have said?

          1. spot on dude,the ball will definitely result in a goal kick.That stupid penalty cost us top 4 last season and I gave up on xhaka that day.

  7. @gerry sorry I saw your post late on the other article, so I have to reply you here.

    You said, I didn’t say anything concerning the 12years barren years.

    Now let me tell you something you don’t know.

    I remember a time when fan booed the hell out of wenger till he opened up that, he received offer to manage Real Madrid but he has to stay back cos the bank said, they will not loan Arsenal the money if wenger won’t stay for 5years atleast just to pay the money back.

    You know what that means?
    It means they believe he is the only manager that love Arsenal with mind and soul and will be ready to risk his reputation for the club to grow.

    I think this link will help you with what I’m saying.

    https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2016/04/29/arsene-wenger-blames-difficult-climate-created-by-arsenal-fans-a/amp/

    And don’t get me wrong, I didn’t say Arsenal is not a great club before he came but Arsenal got global recognition because of Wenger.
    He changed English boring football to what it is today.

    I just pray Emery contract is not renew after the end of the season, either he makes the top 4 or not.

    And before his fans think taking us to Top 4 is an achievement, just believe when I say, Brendan Rodgers, Nuno Santo, Pellegrini can even make Top 4 with the kind of square we have and with better tactic and beautiful play.
    So making Top 4 is not special.

    I only thank God that Tottenham and Chelsea are not as good as Wenger’s last 2 seasons. Even Man United were far better than this in Wenger 2nd last season.

    So go figure where Arsenal would have be by now, had our other rivals are not dropping in form.
    They are dropping in form drastically compared to Wenger last 2 seasons and Emery fans believe we are improving and yet we can’t even outshine the team that is dropping in form every season.
    So bad.

  8. the average age of this season goalscorers is 23, if you remove aubameyang and lacazette it drops to 21. Its been a while since we had so many young players pushing to start matches, remind me of the fabregas era oh the good memories.

  9. This time round we should finally enjoy the routine win we have been expecting versus midtable opposition at home. No AMN to shoot us in the foot and make it a herculean task. Kids are all gunz-blazing. Martinelli alone has the energy of 3 Ozils high on bath salts. 3-0 win! COYG!

    1. Stop bashing ozil at every opportunity, it was funny when you first started but it isn’t anymore.
      The dude isn’t even playing yet you have been on his case all day.
      move on, your negativity solves nothing . Enjoy the win and be happy

  10. Fans need to get off xhaka’s back .
    He’s our captain and we have to support him. We always look for the slightest excuse to blame him for everything, I can’t even believe that he was to blame for the Manchester United draw but somehow we give him stick for doing nothing wrong.
    The same guendozi and torriera that we are over praising have had bad games too this season.
    As a matter of fact ceballos has had just one good game this season apart from yesterdays game but no one seems to make a big deal about it.
    Our biggest problem at arsenal is emery not xhaka or ozil or Pepe.
    Even a blind man can see that he can’t take us further than this , I do that we qualify for Champions League with him and move him on afterward .

    1. We should all get off the players back and descend on emery right?your logic of support u preached in ur response.

  11. Emery has got to realise that his honeymoon period is over, he had better get his acts right or be shown the exit door. This man doesn’t even know his starting xi and such can affect the balance and cohesion of the team. He’s just too myopic.

  12. Wow we have a good match and still ‘fans’ find something to b*tch about 🤦‍♂️😂

    Emery has shown what he can do with a balanced squad – like I’ve said all along, all that’s needed is patience, I have no doubt we will be lining up more like that in the PL after international break.

    Ozil would have been a huge detriment to that squad last night, but with the squad that balanced we can once again afford the luxury of a player who offers creativity and not a lot else IF and when he earns it, but I would question why you would want to introduce a weak link if its not needed 🤷‍♂️

    Xhaka is not the best player in the world but I feel even he will look much better in that setup. Without the need to be running to constantly cover others mistakes he can focus on his game, and generally speaking, in previous matches where he hasn’t been pulled all over the pitch he hasn’t been terrible.

    All in all I think we can finally start getting a bit excited, all our youngsters are fighting for those starting spots, those who have been having problems in their game are looking for redemption, chemistry is starting to form between many of the squad (helped in part by Emery’s tinkering/rotation) and whilst we seem to be finally finding our feet our rivals are still struggling….. Not so bad after all 😉

    1. Nice comment Madhatter,I support the set up and I am sure the coach,players and the technical staff are doing it all to impress us.

  13. how can you conclude ozil who hasn’t been given much chance this season would have been detrimental to set up last night ,but xhaka who has only been consistent when it comes only to making errors will be of good to that team?.bro I think that is double standard

    1. I never said that Xhaka would have been good for that set up, but that balance would make him look better and allow him to play his game 🤷‍♂️

      The same is true for Ozil, I don’t write him off but he would have been detrimental because last night the team was pressing well and Ozil for all his creativity is about as useful as a chocolate tea pot when it comes to pressing without the ball (even Xhaka offers more in that regard). But like I also said, the squad when it is that balanced can actually afford to have that luxury IF he earns it and its needed, whether or not its needed when the squad is purring like that is another matter 🤷‍♂️

  14. Özil would not fit into Liverpool’s side, nor Man City, and I’m sure Brendan Rogers wouldn’t have him in his team the way they are playing now either. He slows the game down, is overrun by more physical players, gives the ball away and doesn’t chase to recover, etc etc. FOR GOODNESS SAKE, get over him. He is not worth having in the team for the one admittedly brilliant pass that he makes every 20th game he plays in.

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