New Gunners or Ghosts Of Paris??

Hnmmm so we are off to Paris eeh? After a hard fought last gasp victory on Saturday there Is no time to sit and admire Giroud’s coiffed hair while sipping on 3points Nope, successful teams know they cant bask in the aura of their image like a CR7 oogling at his own beach body with narcissistic admiration…. Southampton is already a distant past of 3points done, now is time to focus on an occasion where the “Champions” come to battle in the UEFA Champions league 2016/17.

2006 UCL Final  Stad de France- Paris   coutesy: Getty Images

 Looking through our group one can't help but put the group winner between Arsenal or PSG, no offence to ...FC Basel and Ludogorets, no Leicester fairytale here. So many questions come to mind on Arsenal, Will this be Wenger's last roll of the dice in the UCL, can we top our group, are we now mature enough to handle the pressure have lessons been learnt from past repeated mistakes??? While 19 consecutive years qualifying for this group stage maybe something to extol, a habitual round of 16 exit 6 consecutive seasons reeks of same old same old frustrating Gunners that can't be depended on as they let you down. Wenger has to be running out of excuses as to why the Team seems to come unstuck here regardless of the opponent (Monaco hellooo). This year it appears that the luck of the draw has us starting with what has to be d most difficult match of the group stage, on paper ooo cuz after all this is football and Arsenal..... anything can happen. Considering that Paris hasn’t being a particularly good hunting ground for Arsenal. We have lost two finals there, in 1995 UEFA cup final and 2006 Champions league final. I hope this will be positively different, why not? One can dare to dream, yeah PSG has kolobied the Ligue 1 since the billionaires from Qatar took them over making it their own but still remain short of that extra step up into the "league of champions"  Arsenal can boast of a Final appearance at least . Speaking of leagues their start to this year's championat hasn't been the stellar usual, only 2wins and 1loss 1draw, very unlike d PSG we know, maybe losing Ibrahimovic Levezzi & Deschamps has them in some sort of Transition which Arsenal might do well to capitalize on. They still have very good players in Di maria (yeah he bummed at Man u, we know) Verratti, Matuidi, Cavani, Moura. Pastore. Motta and of course Thiago silva at the back. Some say that, in selling David Luiz back to Chelsea they have actually strengthened…....now that’s funny init? Arsene still has an almost full complement of a squad to call on except Ramsey who is a bit short on fitness while Koscielny is available after the eye incident he suffered on Saturday which is good news for the Gunners.

“He's alright,” confirmed the boss.

“He had a big knock on his face [after the Southampton game] but recovered quite well. I was concerned after the game that he wouldn't be available, but he's alright.”

We all know Koscielny had been key to our defensive solidity especially as Mustafi  settles in, it would be asking a lot of  Mustafi to play alongside Holding (despite his impressive start so far). I expect Xhaka to bounce Coq in midfield with Carzola retaining his spot and  Ozilla just ahead of them. I would still prefer to start Perez over Giroud just to get him bedded with d team quickly flanked by walcott/iwobi and Alexis. I believe a draw would be ok from Paris but who says the Gunners can't nick a win here. Don't be a kill joy ....one can dream naa.  My Team would look like 

Bells__ Skod___Kos___Nacho

                                                                     

              Xhaka___Santi

                      Ozil

     Iwobi____Perez_____Alexis

Subs: Gibbs, Giroud, Coq, Elneny, Walcott.   

Anyway the final result at the end will depend on which Arsenal Team shows up, the Boyz who we have come to expect to bottle things as usual or the Men as Wenger bullishly seems to think. 90+ minutes should tell. Do enjoy the game wherever you are...........Ciao