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PREVIEW: Arsenal v Coventry, Team News, Preferred XI And Prediction

By on January 24, 2014

Arsenal welcome Coventry City to the Emirates tonight in the fourth round of the FA Cup.

It’s going to be a strange feeling playing on a Friday night but it’s certainly a welcome opportunity when you consider we’ll have an extra days rest ahead of Tuesday’s clash with Southampton.

We reached the fourth round of the cup after beating rivals Tottenham 2-0 in the last round so after being given a tough third round fixture, it’s a relief to face League One opposition tonight.

However, that’s not to say we should be taking them lightly as we all know the ‘smaller’ teams up their game when they play the big boys, particularly in the cups.

We found that out last season when Blackburn came to the Emirates and beat us 1-0 in the fifth round, so we must guard against complacency tonight.

Team News

With that said, I still think we’ll see Arsene Wenger make several changes from the side that beat Fulham last week.

Lukasz Fabianski, Carl Jenkinson and Kieran Gibbs are all expected to start with the likes of Wojciech Szczesny and Bacary Sagna given a rest.

It looks like Thomas Vermaelen is still out with a knee injury so Per Mertesacker and Laurent Koscielny will start at the back.

The boss has already confirmed that Tomas Rosicky, Aaron Ramsey and Mikel Arteta are still out, so it’s looks like Mathieu Flamini and Jack Wilshere will start in midfield while Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Lukas Podolski are almost certain to play in attack.

Nicklas Bendtner returned to training this week after recovering from an ankle knock so Olivier Giroud should get a rest, while highly-rated youngster Gideon Zelalem could feature at some point.

Preferred XI

Prediction

Despite making some changes, the team named above is more than capable of beating League One Coventry at home so I’d expect us to win this and book our place in the draw for the next round.  Arsenal 3-0 Coventry. COYG!!!!

What are your thoughts about tonight’s game?

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