MATCH DAY BLOG - STATEMENT START, PLEASE

ARSENAL VS WOLVES GAME DAY PREVIEW

The season is here, my friends. The 2024/25 campaign marks the first time in a very, very long time that we can genuinely say… we could actually do this.

Our squad is the strongest it has been in 20 years. The ideas are well established. The players have been through hell and have felt the pain of missing out enough times for it to fuel them through the most fatigued moments. We have a manager in his prime, we’re coming off the back of five months of electric form, and there are no injuries… it’s time to deliver a big trophy.

I’ll say it boldly this season – the expectation for me is that we win the Premier League. I expect it, not because we’re Arsenal and that’s the standard. I expect it because I genuinely believe this is our year to shine and take what is ours.

The summer transfer window hasn’t quite taken us to where we’d like to be yet. I don’t think we’re moving on a forward until Reiss or Eddie find new homes. There is definitely a difficult kink in this story – we want cover for Bukayo Saka. We demanded that the club take an interest in a player with explosive pace, direct running, and a bit of world-class magic that we have lacked at points… but we haven’t found that, again.

Unless that bit of magic is Ethan Nwaneri.

Do you sign a 24-year-old right-wing monster if you think Nwaneri is ready for the fight this season? Do you adjust your thinking if you believe the next Oscar Bobb could be right in front of us? Do you start to believe that a fit and firing Jesus could be more than capable of taking minutes off Saka if needed? Do you start to believe that maybe Saka could pick up that role from Odegaard if Nwaneri could cover out wide?

You can find yourself in a bind pretty quickly when considering what Arsenal are planning, especially if you quite like the idea that Nwaneri was interesting enough for Manchester City to pursue him hard last year.

That said, if an attractive deal opens up in the last week of the window and we have the space in the squad, who knows? You won’t catch me crying if a speed monster arrives packaged with a bow next Friday.

Outside of a forward, I’m not really sure where else we’d be looking for players. A back-up keeper if Ramsdale leaves, sure. A striker? I have my doubts unless Arteta spots some value with Ivan Toney at under £40m.

The reality of our squad now is that it’s largely settled, and if the right players aren’t here right now, there’s no point in adding dross. Calafiori and Merino solve depth problems that could have been fatal. After those two, we have enough strength in the squad to make it to January.

Our start is quite challenging compared to others. Wolves on the opening day is a real bag of ‘who knows,’ but we should be more than a match for them based on the form we’ve shown in pre-season so far. Cunha looks like he’s going to be fit, along with Podence, and a couple of other doubts that would have made the game a bit easier.

Arsenal has a pretty fit squad bar the usual suspect in Tierney and Tomiyasu who are a few weeks away. Timber is back in the mixer tomorrow, though I think we should all caution that his return from injury is going to be bumpy. Form will dip in and out. It’ll be tough. So we have to be patient with him and hope Arteta doesn’t burn him too hard early on.

The main starting 11 question I have tomorrow is focused on left back - based on form, hard to look past Zinchenko. I’d imagine midfield will be Declan, Kai, and Odegaard, and our front three will be Martinelli, Saka, and Jesus. That’s a beastly starting 11. I can’t wait to see what they can do this season.

The key for me is to make a statement early-on. Show that we’re the same team that beat Everton. Move into the next four games with some momentum and purpose. Wolves (H), Villa (A), and Brighton (H) are all very winnable games – but we’ll need to be in fifth gear from the off.

Post-international break, things get tricky. City (A) and Spurs (A) already have me waking up in cold sweats. But the reality is, we don’t have to win all these games, we just have to avoid losing really early in the season. It’s unfortunate that the fixtures roll this badly for us, but the benefit is that if we take an early away scalp, it means we’re done with two top-six away days before the end of September. That’s good times, baby.

Mikel Arteta and the boys are giving off some real winning energy in the media.

“On the last day, we had a gathering together with all the club’s players, and they were coming to me and saying: ‘We are going to do it next year, we are going to be better, we want more.’ And when you see that, you accept they’re the ones driving that ambition, so that’s always possible.

“It’s like you’re trying to climb the highest mountain. It’s the most difficult league in the world, and you feel surrounded by a lot of people who have the same ambition every single day to achieve it. We’re certainly going to try.”

This is exactly what you want to hear from your coach. We’re not shying away from where we are in the project; there are no excuses hanging in the air, just total focus on delivering what Arsenal need.

Ok, that’s me done. I hope everyone heading to the game enjoys the summer beers, reunites with their Arsenal families, and indulges in a massive doner kebab to celebrate the win afterwards.

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