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Arsenal: Alex Sanchez Benching Seals Half-Known Fate
By Josh Sippie
Arsenal went into a crucial match against Liverpool with Alexis Sanchez on the bench. That pretty much does it then, time to move on.
Arsenal startled the entire known world when they released their starting XI. And I don’t mean because Danny Welbeck was finally starting. Obviously missing from the starting XI was Alexis Sanchez, the man who wants to play every game and always gets his way.
This was an absolutely crucial match up in whatever hopes of a title charge Arsene Wenger wanted to mount and with no note of an injury, this benching could only really mean one thing – that he is headed out to Juventus.
The problem is that it’s March. There are still two months to go in the season and unless Alexis is pulling a Mario Gotze and proclaiming that he will not play, which is as likely as the Chilean asking for the day off, then perhaps Wenger has made an executive decision to not play someone who is forcing his exit.
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The only other possibility is that he is being saved for the Tuesday match against Bayern Munich, but if that’s the case, then what the hell? We would have to beat the Germans by four goals, something that has never happened. Not anywhere.
Meanwhile, the Premier League title is looking far more likely than moving on in the Champions League, and seeing as how the title chase is pretty much over, that should tell you how likely beating Bayern Munich by four is.
This is obviously rather troubling. Mesut Ozil’s absence was accounted for as he’s come down with the flu, but there was no a single mention of Alexis Sanchez and what may have become of him.
In other news, Lucas Perez is again not starting in favor of young Alex Iwobi, who is quickly coming to be despised by the fans because of his inability to find consistency and Wenger’s refusal to sit him. It’s another Olivier Giroud situation.
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Francis Coquelin is also inexplicably starting as the Gunners send out a highly questionable starting XI with far too many questions for Wenger to answer for.