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My Preferred Arsenal Starting XI To Face Napoli

By on December 10, 2013

It’s back to Champions League action as we take on Napoli in our final Champions League game on Wednesday night.

The task is pretty simple. Avoid a 3-goal defeat to ensure qualification and earn a draw or win to secure top spot in the group.

It’s always difficult to predict what kind of mindset the manager and players will have going into a game like this. We’re so close to the knockout stages but if we go into the game with the wrong attitude, Napoli nick an early goal and the nerves start kicking in, then things can turn ugly very quickly.

So despite calls from some fans to rest key players tomorrow, I think we should play the best team capable of getting the result we need to qualify. And I also think Arsene won’t take any risks.

Bacary Sagna is out with a hamstring injury so Carl Jenkinson will continue at right-back. Sagna’s loss is a blow so Jenks is going to have to put in a huge display tomorrow.

The rest of the back five should pick themselves, and I’d like to see Mathieu Flamini start alongside Aaron Ramsey in midfield. The likelihood is that Mikel Arteta will start, but I personally think Flamini and Rambo is out best option for this game.

Theo Walcott starting on the right is a MUST. The threat of his pace on the break will force Napoli to sit a little deeper than they may want to and prevent them from being able to put us under too much pressure.

Santi Cazorla has been disappointing lately and I think Jack Wilshere or even Tomas Rosicky could come in on the left side, with Mesut Ozil supporting Olivier Giroud up front.

This is the XI I’d like the boss to go with:

Get an away goal, get the job done early and then we take the likes of Ozil and Giroud off with half an hour to go. But this game is far from a dead rubber, so let’s not take any unnecessary risks and play our strongest team.

COYG!!!

What team would you pick?

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