Preview: Arsenal vs Hull City

This weekend we face Hull city and thanks to the week-long rest that our first team got thanks to the League Cup, they should all be fresh and fit for Saturday's match. The injury list continues to include Nasri, Diaby, and of course Eduardo & Rosicky. Also, Song will not play this weekend thanks to an injury he picked up on Wednesday. This seems to indicate that it will indeed be Denilson startling alongside Fabregas in the centre of midfield. Here's the probable lineup:

Almunia
Sanga-Toure-Gallas-Silvestre/Clichy (if fit)
Eboue-Fabregas-Denilson-Walcott
Adebayor-V.Persie

Now there is of course the chance that Bendtner could start in place of Van Persie due to his excellent scoring form as of late, but I think it's more luckily that the Dane will come on as an impact substitute in the second half. Also, as you see above, I think that Sivestre has a good chance of starting this weekend. But this all depends on how Clichy heals up today and tomorrow morning. If he's fit, he'll probably play about 60 minutes or so before being replaced with Silvesre, thus allowing the new signing to ease his way into the team. However if Clichy's not fit, then it's obvious that Silvestre will be thrust into the team. It's sometimes hard for older players to adapt to a new system of play, but thankfully Man Utd's style of off-the-ball movement isn't extremely different from our own so his learning curve should be short.

As for the match, I don't think we can go into it expecting to cruise to a win. Hull's manager seems to be one who will deploy his team against us in Sam Allardice-esque fashion. That is Hull will be playing very physically and will look to break down our play in midfield. Now, if Hull decide to actually play football against us then we will walk away easy winners, as they aren't that good technically. It's if they adopt the style I believe they will that we will have problems. With nothing to lose, expecting a loss, and hoping to scrape a draw, I can easily see them deploying Birmingham-like tactics against us.

Some of you may remember the match against Birmingham in January where we dominated the first half, got a penalty, and went into the break 1-0 ahead. Shortly after the break Birmingham equalised thanks to some sloppy corner defending. They then packed their penalty area with as much as ten players at once, and although we were close to scoring every 30 seconds or so, they resisted and held us to a 1-1 draw at home. I think this type of strategy may be the same on Saturday. Hull will defend with their lives and hope for the lucky goal themselves through a long-ball approach. The team will have to be at their very best tomorrow to beat Hull, but I think they can do it. Who knows, maybe Hull will play like they did against Wigan when they lost 5-0 and we'll crush them. But I don't think that's very likely. I'm going to predict a 2-0 result and hope for more.
Until tomorrow,

Fab 4