A lot of Arsenal fans are pinning their hopes on an upturn in fortunes, defensively speaking, when the three injured defenders of Kieran Tierney, Rob Holding and Hector Bellerin return to first-team action.
The thing is this, there is absolutely no guarantee that it will be any better. If you take each of them individually there is good reason to be anxious.
Kieran Tierney has never played in the Premier League, being a decent player for Celtic in the Scottish Premiership, simply cannot be compared to playing in the Premier League, they are worlds apart.
Rob Holding and Hector Bellerin were both part of an Arsenal team that could not buy a win on the road and while both were on good form when they got injured, that was not always the case, seems to me memories are short when it comes to those two.
Don’t get me wrong, I am hoping deep down that the trio will provide an improvement but these players are not messiahs and the problem with Arsenal’s defence is deeper than simply changing manpower.
It is not always about talent but how the coach instructs the defenders and playing out from the back is always going to lead to mistakes, Arsenal just has not got that art form nailed down.
There is the mental side of it as well and when you get vastly experienced players crumbling and being scared I am not sure that the likes of Tierney, Holding and Bellerin will change that psyche.
The problems with the Arsenal defence start on the training ground and the injured players are just as much part of that as the players that actually played in yesterdays game.
Changing players is not the solution when the mindset at the club is in such a state that a team like Watford can basically frighten them to death.