Arsenal don’t need Sanchez to beat Spurs by Sam P
As an Arsenal fan I have to say it through gritted teeth, but I do think that our north London rivals Tottenham have got it together a bit and are looking in pretty good form at the minute. So they will no doubt be fancying their chances of beating the Gunners when we play them at White Hart Lane in Saturday’s early Premier League kick-off.
And the fact that our star man Alexis Sanchez has missed the last two games with a hamstring problem and may miss the derby will be increasing their confidence. But I am here to tell you not to worry, because we do not need Alexis to mash the spuds again.
And I am not just being an over-confident Gooner here. For one thing, Arsenal have scored five goals in our last three games and none of those were scored by the Chilean. He was not even on the pitch for the last two games, so the theory that we are totally reliant on him has already been proved wrong.
The other reason I am so confident is that we now have the perfect team and tactics to counter the threat of Spurs. It is pretty clear where that threat comes from, with Harry Kane and Eriksen scoring and creating almost all of their goals. Over to you Coquelin.
But it will be the team shape and ethic as well as the young Frenchman that will frustrate the spuds and they need the win more than us, leaving them vulnerable to the counter attack and us with the players to exploit it in Walcott, Cazorla, Ozil, Ramsey and Giroud.
The game is set up for the Gunners, even if we have to do without Alexis. With him it could be a demolition job!