Paul Merson reckons Arsenal will win a close game against Leicester in the Premier League’s opening game on Friday.

The former Arsenal man doesn’t have the best record with pre-match predictions, but Gunners fans will be hoping he’s got this one right as he backs the team to scrape past the Foxes at the Emirates.

After defeating Chelsea in the Community Shield, although it was on penalties, Arsenal will be in good spirits heading into their first game of the season. There were some promising performances at the weekend, in particular from new signing Sead Kolašinac, and Alexandre Lacazette looked a lot more promising than Alvaro Morata on the other side of the pitch.

Leicester also have some reasons to be hopeful though. For a start, Arsenal have been awful in their first game of the season in recent years, and this has been seemingly regardless of the opposition. A loss to Liverpool is never the biggest surprise when all your starting centre-backs are out, but Aston Villa and West Ham have also taken three points from the opening day at the Emirates recently.

Merson made a point of noting the Gunners’ inconsistency in this regard, but felt that the early signs are good this year, saying in the Express: “You’re never too sure what you’re going to get with Arsenal but they looked good against Chelsea in the Community Shield, despite being without Alexis Sanchez and Mesut Ozil.”

As well as that, Merson points to the Foxes’ new signing as a potential instigator of an upset: “Kelechi Iheanacho has come to Leicester for a lot of money and, having predominantly come off the bench at Manchester City, it will be interesting to see if he can have an impact from the start for the Foxes.”

Merson went for a 2-1 win for the Gunners, and also tipped Liverpool, United and Chelsea for wins in matches against Watford, West Ham and Burnley respectively.

Although he noted the Blues disappointing result against Arsenal was probably partly as a result of the absence of Eden Hazard, who still won’t be back this weekend, Burnley have just proven too poor away from home.