Arsenal vs Tottenham: How do you fit four superstars?

Arsenal have four superstars that are firing on all cylinders, but how do you fit all four of them into the same starting XI without forcing anything?

I feel like I’m going back in time with this post. Last January, when Arsenal first acquired Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang and Henrikh Mkhitaryan, I wondered how Arsene Wenger could finagle these two, along with Alexandre Lacazette and Mesut Ozil, into the same starting XI.

I was less optimistic back then, that they could all fit. Mostly because Wenger was vehemently opposed to two striker sets, and he just generally didn’t like altering his formation at all.

With Unai Emery, things are different.

Now, the case can be made that the best way to use these four is not to start them all together, but rather to save one or two on the bench for if the match starts to go the wrong way, and there is merit in that argument. We saw that merit against Bournemouth, because Lacazette was wound up to score a goal. He wanted to be part of the fun.

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But let’s say you do want to get all four into the same starting XI. How would you go about doing that without suffering a severe lapse in other facets of play?

Well, it isn’t easy, and there’s not really any convenient answer. The most convenient is a 4-4-2 set, with both strikers up front, Mkhitaryan and Ozil as the wide midfielders, and Granit Xhaka and Lucas Torreira in between them. The risk becomes how well Micki and Ozil can defend, but against Bournemouth, we saw gumption from the latter, and the former always tracks back pretty well.

Another option, perhaps less convenient, is to treat Aubameyang as a winger, and go with a 4-3-3, letting Aubameyang slot wide left, Micky slipping out wide right and Ozil playing a No.10ish role with Xhaka and Torreira in behind.

There’s not a good way to make it work in a three-back set, plain and simple.

But again, as we saw against Bournemouth, they don’t all four have to start to do something truly special. In fact, it could be said that what made Lacazette so fired up was the fact that he hadn’t started, and he wanted to get in on the action.

Whatever the case, all four are ready, all four are confident, and I can’t wait to see what Emery decides to do in this one.