Arsenal vs Qarabag: Sokratis, Laurent Koscielny, both or neither?

Arsenal will be asking a ton of defensive questions this month, and it starts against Qarabag. Who gets the start: Sokratis, Koscielny, both or neither?

This match against Qarabag is supposed to be stress free, yet I’m already stressing out about who Arsenal may or may not decide to start in the two centerback positions. Well, to be fair, I really wasn’t stressed until I started reading around this morning.

First, it was finding out that some are expecting Laurent Koscielny to “make his return” against Qarabag, then, it was seeing Whoscored.com‘s prediction that Mustafi and Sokratis would both start in the throw-away fixture.

Let me get one thing out of the way – Mustafi better not start. In fact, I am saying that so adamantly that I’ll just leave it here and not revisit it. He won’t start. He’s injured. Let him rest.

So then, the question becomes, with so many other players out, how do you line up? Do you start Sokratis? Koscielny? Both? Neither?

It’s hard to say. Let me eliminate the “both” option right now because I’m sincerely hoping that Zech Medley will get the start, to allow us all to get a good long look at whether or not he may be ready for some more first-team consideration.

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Which would leave, one or the other, or neither.

At first, I was in favor of neither. But then again, I see the merit in making sure that Medley has a reliable partner in next to him, to give him some sense of stability, so that swung me back into the question of which one made more sense.

The argument for Sokratis is that he won’t play against Southampton, so he will still have a week off, he’s been great in the first team and he’s about as no-nonsense a partner as you can find in the entire footballing world. But he has also played a lot lately, and giving him an extra break would hardly be a bad thing.

The argument for Koscielny is that you can put him in for 45 minutes and take him off at half (please don’t play him for a full 90 when he is needed against Southampton). Thus, he gets a rousing welcome in front of a home crowd and he starts to get his confidence back, while also infusing us with the confidence of what will undoubtedly be a perfect performance.

It is so 50/50 that it’s hard to even decide, but I am going to predict what I predicted in the starting XI’s – Koscielny. Simply because I want to see him out in front of the Emirates crowd again. Just please take him off at half and save him for Southampton.