Even with Arsenal having allowed Jack Wilshere to go and join Premier League club AFC Bournemouth on loan for the season and with Aaron Ramsey not expected back in action from his hamstring injury until next weekend, the Arsenal defensive midfielder Francis Coquelin could well find himself sat on the bench today as the Gunners play host to Southampton.
With Arsenal also facing the difficult trip to Paris to face the French champions PSG in our first Champions League group game just a few days later, though, Coquelin will be hoping to see some action this week and his combative and tackling ability will more than likely be called for in that tough away game when Arsenal will not be able to dominate the possession as we so often do.
Arsene Wenger already had pretty good options in central midfield, with Mohamed Elneny having been signed in Janury to cope with a few injury problems, including Coquelin´s. And this summer the boss spent bit to bring in the Swiss international star Granit Xhaka, but Le Coq is actually happy about that.
As reported by Arsenal.com he is aware that we need a lot of options to cope with the two domestic cups as well as the EPL and UCL competitions and he knows that the stronger the Arsenal squad is, the more chance we have of achieving at least one of our trophy goals.
Francis said, “With these two additions, the team is looking really strong. We need a few people with injuries to come back, but after that we will have a full competitive squad. We can face the four competitions ahead of us.”
He also declared that the competition for places in the first team among himself, Xhaka, Elneny, Cazorla, Ramsey is good for all of these players as well as the club on the whole.
He went on, “There is loads of competition, but I think that’s a good thing. Obviously we are Arsenal, so we expect competition and a player comes in every year, so it is a great addition. Granit came this year, and I think he is a great addition to the squad.
“Mohamed came in January, and I think he has done well. No one really knew him before he came here, but he has shown how good he is. It is going to be an interesting competition in the middle.”
What I really like about our central options is that they are different, so Wenger can go for a very solid system to protect the back four or a creative and adventurous one to keep teams on the back foot and I think we have got the strongest central midfield in the country. Do you guys agree?
Sam P.