Arsenal vs Chelsea predicted XI: Keep the trajectory

Attack

This is where it fell apart against Bournemouth. Alexandre Lacazette and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang had nine shots combined, only one was on target and it found the back of the net. Reiss Nelson looked great for the first half hour the promptly fell apart.

So you should expect changes. No reason to stick with the same thing when it went wrong so recently.

For starters, let’s get the easy one out of the way. Nicolas Pepe is going to start. He was a regular whirling dervish against Bournemouth for the ten minutes he was on. The dude looked straight angry, and he took it out on the Bournemouth defense. Just a shame he didn’t have more time to play with. That’d have been a fun thing to see.

I’m also going to go out on a limb here and assume that Gabriel Martinelli will be healthy enough to start. That’s a reach, but I’m optimistic. Slot him in on the left wing and get Alexandre Lacazette out of there. I believe that Lacazette still has a lot to give this club, but he was just awful against Bournemouth.

I’d much rather just stick Aubameyang up top and call it a day. Can’t go wrong with that. Hopefully Mikel Arteta agrees with me.