Brighton preview + Raheem Sterling arrives on hectic deadline day

Morning.

While so much focus revolves around deadline day, there’s the small matter of an actual game of football early this afternoon when we take on Brighton at home. Like us, they’re two for two this season, and this has been quite a tricky fixture in recent years.

In terms of team news, hopes that we might see a Mikel Merino debut today were dashed after news emerged he picked up an injury in his first training session following his arrival from Real Sociedad. A collision involving Big Gabi saw him sustain what’s believed to be a fracture to his shoulder, and he’s likely to be sidelined for a good few weeks at least.

It’s so unfortunate for him, and for us, but Mikel Arteta was fairly sanguine about it, saying:

We signed him for many years, not for a few weeks and we need to move on. These things can happen, it was very unfortunate but it’s our reality. Let’s use the time that we have right now to make sure that he’s familiar with everything that we do, how we live, what we expect of him, the team dynamics. He will be in every meeting, so we’ll use that time in the best possible way and, hopefully, in a few weeks he will be ready.

So, my guess is today’s side will be very similar to the one that beat Villa last week. Given Brighton’s strength on the wings, I expect Jurrien Timber to start again at left-back, and after his huge impact off the bench at Villa Park, surely Leandro Trossard has played himself into the starting XI. Beyond that, I can’t see any changes, and given the injury to Merino, the fact we’re still without Gabriel Jesus and Takehiro Tomiyasu, and Eddie Nketiah and Reiss Nelson have both departed, there might be room on the bench for a couple of youth players today.

I’m sure while fans were focused on comings and goings yesterday, the manager and players were preparing fully for this game, so let’s hope that we can do the business and go into the Interlull with the three points under our belts. It’s taking…

Source link : https://arseblog.com/2024/08/brighton-preview-raheem-sterling-arrives-on-hectic-deadline-day/

Author : arseblog

Publish date : 2024-08-31 06:29:53

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