Because of the way that he has begun his football career in the Premier League with a bang, Arsenal will certainly be looking at the Manchester United new boy Anthony Martial as one of the major dangers when Louis van Gaal and his players arrive at the Emirates stadium on Sunday.
And with Arsene Wenger having confirmed that our best defender Laurent Koscielny will miss the game with a hamstring injury, some Arsenal fans could be getting a bit worried. While I would love our French centre back to be available, there are reasons to believe that Gabriel and Per Mertesacker will be able to handle the young French forward.
A Sky Sports report explains how Martial´s success so far has come from his pace and dribbling skills, but in Gabriel we have the ideal player to counter this. Not only is the Brazilian being clocked as the fifth fastest centre back in the league, his speed is higher than Martial´s own.
Also, Gabriel is proving himself to be a great tackler and has yet to be dribbled past once this season. In fact, the Arsenal centre back has only been dribbled past once in his entire Premier League career so far, so the Man United youngster is likely to find his job a lot tougher on Sunday than it has been on previous games.
I know that you will be thinking here, what if he targets Mertesacker instead? Well pace is certainly an issue there, but when you look at the stats on Squawka.com between our three main centre backs, although Koscielny has the better total score and wins in many areas, the German has not lost a single tackle and wins more per game than Koscielny and almost as many as Gabriel. Our BFG has also won an amazing 90 percent of his EPL duels this season compared to around 60 percent for the other two.
So have Arsenal got the defence to cancel out the main attacking threat of Man United?
The Emirates pitch will burn with pace (if possible) when we will see some of the following clashes:
Theo Walcott vs Smalling
Alexis Sanchez vs Darmian
Hector Bellerin vs Depay
Gabriel Paulista vs Martial
Boss Kos may be out for 3weeks….if that’s true, then we’ll miss Him on Sunday. Hoping Gabriel and Mertsacker/Chambers play well on Sunday.
Martial has been playing well so far’, if we don’t handle him properly’, he’ll give us problems. But for mi’, we should be watchful of Rooney….He always have a good game against us whenever he plays even when He is not in top form.
On the positive side, I hope Sanchez-Walcott continues scoring and combining well together. I really don’t want us to lose the game!
Come on Bob, You obviously mean Bang and not Ban ?
You need to Focus mate or the wenger out mob will be on your case next… No slacking allowed here! ?
i think we would definetely stop martial…and dats bcoz he lacks experience and with gabriel i think he would be silenced and lets not forget we also have walcott and i bet u he is going to deal with manu back four bcoz he has d experience dat martial lacks.so i expect a win..COYG
The game seems to have all the ingredients for a high-scoring draw. Anyone for a 5-5 score? 😉
With De-Gea and Cech as goalkeepers? Very well….
I’ve watched almost all the games martial has played in and while his finishing has been amazing, he’s very composed for his age but other than that he’s been awful. He offers no focal point and the game really passes him by. He drifts the wings 2-3 times and will whip in a cross but his all around play has been pretty garbage.
I’m truly not worried about this kid at all his goals have seriously masked his performances. And since its United the media does not care
He’s a kid. He’s got a few years yet to improve and he is good enough to score into our net
O absolutely im not discounting that at all he’s got huge potential everyone can see it. All I’m saying is the way people have been raving about him and all the little rags going on about how happy they are with him is being blown way out of proportion.
He really hasn’t been good at all, but watch him score a hatty against us lol
LOL With our luck recently, even Rooney could get a hattrick against us lol
Dude Rooney always plays well against us it’s so annoying
Dont make him eat your words. Not that you feel srry later after the game.
Gabriel has to man mark Martial,
even though wenger doesn’t like to play that system,
It’s the only way to stop the striker from targeting BFG,
As we all know, Arsenal’s style of play has become so predictable that even mickey mouse teams are now beating us and then tormenting us with that fact!
We really do need to go back to basics,
With Defending being our main priority and patiently waiting to counter attack our opponents.
Cech
Debuchy, BFG, Gabriel, Monreal
Bellerin, Coquelin, Gibbs
Ramsey/Cazorla
Walcott, Sanchez
I really do believe that line up would keep a cleansheet against most top teams,
Defending deep, whilst Walcott and Sanchez waiting in line with the oppersistions defence, ready to counter attack!
We will have pace on the wings to help with the defending as well as the attacking.
Man Utd goals power brookers are: Chris Smalling, Michael Carrick, Wyane Rooney and now Anthony Martial who are threats the Gunners should bind and cast out of the match.
Man Utd goals power brookers are: Chris Smalling, Michael Carrick, Wyane Rooney and now Anthony Martial who are the threats the Gunners should bind and cast out of the match.
you mean that Man Utd goals power brookers are: Chris Smalling, Michael Carrick, Wyane Rooney and now Anthony Martial who are the threats the Gunners should bind and cast out of the match?
haha just kidding mate. It got up twice
Stats show that Olimpiacos has never won away against an english team before Arsenal came. And also, Zagreb did not not win against any english team before Arsenal came around.
We are breaking records. F… Yea.
We will also need for Bellerin to keep Depay at bay…
What about Mata? He pops in a few goals.
@pubgooner
LE Coq got him on block…
Mata has been United’s best player by a long shot imo. Nacho is gonna have to stick with him cause he drifts in field a lot
I hope the lads really turn up for this one and display their mettle and quality. Its going to be very tough match. I’m sure Van Gaal will set them up to be defensive and hit us when we lose our shape; they typical tactic employed against Arsenal.
OT: Any reasons as to why we don’t have goal celebration songs in stadiums in England? Like I was watching that game of Bayern in which Lewadownski scored 5 and the atmosphere at the Allianz was electric with a really catchy song that the crowd really seemed to love. Something has to be done to improve the atmosphere inside the Emirates. Its so flat it doesn’t even feel like a home match for Arsenal at times. I am pretty sure there is some correlation between the ambiance and our poor performances at home. Our away fans seem to make a lot more noise.
We really need to win this one quench all the hype on United and Martial at the moment by the media, it is disgusting.
3 points or no trophy on sunday
As the man said, “there`s lies. lies, bloody lies and statisics”. Stats mean so little on the day
yet pundits and journo`s use them as packing when writing articles. I can`t see out defence holding United back.
One thing I`ve learned when making comments on Just Arsenal is never be critical, never rock the boat.