Tonight, the Gunners visit Hillborough to take on a Sheffield Wednesday side that aren’t doing too badly in the Skybet Championship. Carlos Carvalhal’s men are currently in ninth place with five wins, five draws and three defeats in their first 13 Championship games. Sheffield’s last win over Arsenal came in 1998 and the manager has openly admitted that his team has a 10 percent chance of beating the Gunners,
“We will fight for the whole match and we will be competitive. It will be interesting to see how it goes. We have probably a 10% chance of getting through. It is not very much but it is better than zero.
“Zero means you can do nothing, 10% means we will have 10% of the chances and we have to grab them. It will be a fantastic day and it will make people remember the past and we hope games like this can be normal for us in the future.
“We are playing one of the best teams in the world. I think they have scored 18 goals in their last six games and that includes games against Manchester United and Bayern Munich.”
Arsenal Team News
Jeorge Bird, an avid follower of Arsenal youth football, tweeted the names of a couple of youngsters that trained with the first team. There were no household names there but with David Ospina suffering a shoulder injury, there is a slight hope for young goalie, Matt Macey, to get his first senior cap although it’s more than likely that Petr Cech would be the custodian between the sticks in tonight’s game. There were a couple of senior players that trained as well and you would expect them to feature tonight.
Flamini, Gibbs, Chambers, Walcott, Mertesacker, Cech, Debuchy, Campbell amongst the first-team players who trained.
— Jeorge Bird (@jeorgebird) October 26, 2015
One player that would be on the spotlight will be Joel Campbell. In 13 games for the Gunners over the course of two seasons, the Costa Rican forward has failed to open his goalscoring account for the club. Due to work permit issues after joining the club in 2011, Campbell has been shipped out on loan to Lorient (27 apps, four goals), Real Betis (33 apps, two goals), Olympiakos (43 apps, 11 goals) and Villarreal (20 apps, one goal). Besides his campaign in Greece that turned out to be a success, Campbell hasn’t lit much fireworks in the other teams he has played for.
Arsene Wenger believes in the lad and has urged him to step up,
“I like Joel Campbell very much for two reasons. One is that he has outstanding individual quality, but he is also a team player. He works very hard for the team. I’m convinced he will get a chance here and that he will take it. He has another opportunity against Sheffield Wednesday and I’m hopeful that he will show that he has the quality to play for Arsenal.”
The boss has signaled that he’s going to field an under-strength side and he expects his fringe players to stand up and be counted.
Arsenal Injury / Suspension News
Jack Wilshere (ankle), Tomas Rosicky (knee), Danny Welbeck (knee), Aaron Ramsey (hamstring) and Mikel Arteta (ankle)
Arsenal Predicted Lineup
Sheffield Wednesday Team News
The Owls are just coming off a vital away win against Rotherham United with goals from their joint top scorers, Lucas Joao and new signing from Watford, Fernando Forestieri. Both players have bagged three goals for their team this season and would be hoping to cause an upset like the one they did in the third round of the Capital One Cup, defeating Newcastle at St. James Park.
Sheffield had defeated the likes of Mansfield Town and Oxford United before their giant killing exploits against Newcastle.
Sheffield Wednesday Injury / Suspension News
Micheal Turner, Alex Lopez, Marco Matias and Modou Sougou.
Sheffield Wednesday Predicted Lineup
Team Form
Arsenal
- Last Five Games: L W W W W
- Last Result: Arsenal 2 (Giroud 36′, Koscielny 38′) – Everton 1 (Barkley 43′)
- Leading Goalscorer: Alexis Sanchez (7)
Sheffield Wednesday
- Last Five Games: W D D W W
- Last Result: Rotherham United 1 (Thorpe 90?) – Sheffield Wednesday 2 (Joao 46′, Forestieri 50′)
- Leading Goalscorer: Lucas Joao, Fernando Forestieri (3)
Gooner Daily predicts 3 – 0 to the Arsenal
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