Arsenal v Sunderland – preview

For many Arsenal players, the international break came at a perfect time.

There’s no doubt that Arsenal’s confidence has being dented over the past few weeks. In 7 Premier League games, they’ve only managed 2 victories, an appalling record for title contenders. A notable 8-2 defeat by Manchester United and last week’s 2-1 loss to North London rivals Spurs are among the results that have left Arsenal’s title hopes hanging by a thread.

Sunderland have shared a similar start to the season, sitting just 1 point behind their upcoming opponents.

While Arsene Wenger has received the full support of the Arsenal board, Sunderland have being less vocal and Steve Bruce looks more and more like a man under pressure.

In Sunderland’s previous Premier League outing, they got off to a disastrous start, conceding two goals in the opening 10 minutes to West Brom at home. However, Steve Bruce will take some comfort from the character his team showed to rescue a point and finish the game 2-2. It seems as though the groans from Sunderland fans are starting to get louder and if Sunderland don’t start picking up results soon, there may be a vacancy at the Stadium of Light.

Ironically for Sunderland, the absence of an Arsenal player is a major concern for them this weekend. No I’m not talking about Manuel Almunia, but loan signing Niklas Bendtner. The Danish striker will be ineligible to play this weekend’s fixture against his parent club due to the terms of his loan agreement.

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While the Black Cats look stretched in attacking options, Arsenal enjoy a wealth of attacking talent. The likes of Robin van Persie, Gervinho, Theo Walcott, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and co. are enough to terrorise Sunderland’s defence this weekend.

Personally, I’d love to see AOC start his first league game at the weekend. The 18-year-old has really impressed and I wouldn’t be surprised if he starts pushing Walcott for his place very soon. After all, Wenger’s philosophy is ‘If you’re good enough, you’re old enough’.

It’s fair to say that Arsenal’s main problems don’t rest with the forwards. We all know that Arsenal’s worst enemy this season has being their old chestnut, the defence. For the past few years, both fans and neutrals have identified Arsenal’s defence as their weak point. However, Arsenal’s back four have looked poor this season and will need to perform better as a unit this Sunday. Vermaelen’s absence is a huge loss but seems somewhat familiar to the Arsenal set-up at this stage. The mobility of Arsenal’s summer signing Per Mertesacker has been well publicised thus far, but you can’t underestimate the experience he brings to the Arsenal back four.

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