Unai Emery’s men travel to Azerbaijan for the second game of their Europa League campaign on Thursday, with Qarabag FK standing between them and three points.
Arsenal picked up a 4-2 win against FC Vorskla in the first game of the group stages, which left the Gunners top of Group E on goals scored. Qarabag, meanwhile, are bottom of the group, having lost 2-0 to Sporting Lisbon.
Emery named a strong squad for that first game at the Emirates, but with the length of the trip to Azerbaijan and another Premier League game on Sunday, he’s likely to leave one or two extra players at home on this occasion.
Let’s have a look at our predictions to start Thursday’s match:
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Danny Welbeck is in top form at the moment for Arsenal. He has three goals in his only two starts of the season, and another goal in his 54 minutes of Premier League substitute appearances so far. At the weekend, he came on and won the ball back for Arsenal’s second goal. He should be a nailed on starter on Thursday.
Henrikh Mkhitaryan won’t travel with the side, after deciding it’s not safe for him with the political situation between his country Armenia and Azerbaijan.
You wouldn’t expect Mesut Özil, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang or Alexandre Lacazette to start either. Then again, after Aubameyang started the last Europa League match, who knows?
Alex Iwobi should return to the starting XI after another impressive cameo against Watford. Eddie Nketiah didn’t play for the u23s on Monday, so he’s available to start this match.
After Unai Emery didn’t give the young striker a chance against Brentford, it’s hard to know if he will this time either. Given Mkhitaryan’s absence though, it’s either Nketiah or one of the senior trio mentioned above. We’re going to optimistically predict the 19-year-old getting a game.
Click ‘Next’ for our full predicted starting XI