Match Preview: The Gunners Look To Maintain Perfect Europa League Record
Arsenal will look to keep their perfect start to the Europa League going when they face Molde on Thursday night.
Much has been made of Arsenal’s draw away to Leeds last time out, however, the Europa League presents a change of pace for the Gunners as they look to get back to winning ways.
Arsenal currently sits top of Group B with three wins from three, scoring nine goals and only conceding two. Molde sits behind the Gunners in the second position and can go level on points should they upset the North London side.
Team news
Both Mo Elneny and Sead Kolasinac are still unavailable after their positive tests for Coivd-19. Midfielder Thomas Partey will miss another match due to his thigh injury and Bukayo Saka did not travel to Norway after suffering an injury late against Leeds. Willian will also miss after picking up a calf injury in the same game.
Calum Chambers is a doubt as he is still recovering from his knee injury and has only played a handful of U/23 games. Pablo Mari is progressing well; however, he has only just started full training and could still be a week or two away.
David Luiz is in line to return to the starting XI after the birth of his daughter and could be partnered with Shkodran Mustafi along with Cedric and Ainsley Maitland Niles rounding out the defence.
Alex Runarsson could get some rare minutes between the posts. He did impress last time out, keeping a clean sheet in the Gunners 3-0 win over Dundalk.
Joe Willock should return to the midfield alongside Granit Xhaka and Dani Ceballos, having been the starting three against Leeds last time out.
In attack, Eddie Nketiah should lead the line with Reiss Nelson and Nicolas Pepe out wide. The Ivorian should get the chance to make amends for his red card at the weekend and will be hoping to be in a good performance here.
Predicted Line-up: Runarsson, Cedric, Luiz, Mustafi, Maitland-Niles, Willock, Xhaka, Ceballos, Nelson, Nketiah, Pepe.
Florin Balogun, Emile Smith Rowe, Miguel Azeez, and Ben Cottrell were all named in the squad as Mikel Arteta takes a youthful squad to Norway.
With the potential to secure progress through to the next round, a win for Mikel Arteta’s side is critical to take form into their next Premier League clash against Wolves.
Arsenal should have too much for Molde and continue their winning ways in Europe.
