Kevin Whitcher's Arsenal Blog

Arsenal 2 Sevilla 0        Champions League Group Stage Matchday Four    Wednesday 8th November 2023 8pm     1 –  Injury hit Gunners . The list is getting longer. Timber and Partey go without saying. Jesus has joined them as another who needs time to recover. Odegaard has a hip injury, Smith Rowe also unavailable, and even the normally reliable (well, in terms of fitness) Eddie Nketiah had to sit this one out.    2 –  So, who plays centre forward?  The absence of Smith Rowe as potential cover for Odegaard meant Mikel Arteta had to pick two from Trossard, Havertz and Vieira. The Portuguese midfielder was the one to miss out. Havertz played in the club captain’s position, with Trossard as a nominal, but very mobile centre forward.    3 –  Sevilla weakened too.  It’s been a wretched season for the Spanish side, who as Europa League winners only last May, were expected to provi...

Sevilla 1 Arsenal 2    Champions League Matchday 3  Tuesday 24th October 2023 8.45pm (local time)    Firstly to mention that I am on holiday in a time zone nine hours behind Spain, so as this game kicked off at 11.45am for me, I was out doing holiday stuff and watched the match in full the following day on the official website. So for the sake of completion, an entry for the game.   I am going to do this differently today and list some thoughts/reflections in a numbered fashion – I might continue doing this given I am not rushing to do the pieces and want to get away from reporting the facts of a match everyone’s watched. 1 – Gabriel Jesus’ ability to play a pass and take on players to create a chance was the difference in this game, with the two goals coming from his skill. There have been questions about his contribution in terms of goal tally, given he plays as the main striker, but if we can see more performances with this kind of brilliance, such ...