Wolves Preview

By: Martin | November 6th, 2009

Wolverhampton Wanderers

Position: 17th, 2-4-5 (10 points, -7 goal differential)

Recent Form: LLDDD

Home Form: 1-2-2

Away to the midlands tomorrow to face Wolves at the Molineaux. Wolves are a solid side–I picked them to stay up this season, and I actually hope they do. They play much more entertaining football than sides like Brum, Hull, Blackburn, Bolton, Stoke, etc., and I’d hate to see another West Brom situation, because it would send a clear message that the way to avoid relegation is by playing tight at the back, hoofing the ball upfield, and kicking the opposition up in the air whenever they have the ball. I think this is already happened in the Premiership to some degree, and it really does make more much less entertaining viewing. So aside from tomorrow’s match and the fixture at the Emirates, I wish Wolves all the best.

But the fact is that they are a much inferior club to Arsenal, and there is no excuse for not winning this match. While Wolves have had some decent results at home (beating Fulham, drawing with Aston Villa), there is a substantial gulf in class between the two sides, and if we play our game they will be overmatched.

Arsene Wenger came out and said this was a very important match to win, because the Manchester United-Chelsea match is an opportunity to pick up points on at least one of those clubs. And he is, of course, right. A win tomorrow puts us very, very close to the top of the table. I think that in order to win the league, you have to do the following three things: (1) win almost every match against non-top 4 opposition at home; (2) win almost every match against mid-table and below clubs away; and (3) fare relatively well against top 4 opposition at home and top half of the table clubs away. Last season, we did very well at (3), but were unable to do (1) (losses at home to Hull and Aston Villa, draws with Spurs, West Ham, Sunderland, and Fulham) (2) (losing away to Stoke, draws with Spurs and Boro).

In our 6 league matches against fellow Big 4 opposition, we went 2-3-1, for 9 points. This was more than Manchester United (5 pts.) and Chelsea (4 pts.). But those clubs both finished well above us in the table, because they consistently beat all comers at home and played very well away. I think it was a matter of focus–at times, especially in the first half of the season, we seemed to go into games assuming we were going to win, and were punished for it. If you want to win the league, you’ve got to come into every fixture prepared and focused, and we didn’t do that last season. So far this season, with the exception of the last 20 minutes of the West Ham match, we’ve done this, but matches like the one tomorrow will really tell us a lot about how legitimate our title chances are.

They’ve been pretty tight at the back at home, only surrendering 6 goals in their 5 matches at home, and Arsenal has been prone to giving up goals in bunches away from the Emirates (9 in 5 matches), so don’t be surprised if this turns into a closer match than many expect. Wolves have two solid strikers in Kevin Doyle and Sylvan Ebanks-Blake, and are capable of putting the ball into the net, so Gallas, Vermaelen, and Song will need to have good games.

The team news for us is good news in that there is no news–no new injuries picked up in Wednesday’s Champions League fixture against AZ. If we can make it through this match without picking up any knocks, we’ll be bolstered by the returns of Walcott and Rosicky, with Denilson and Clichy hopefully not too far behind them. Lineup:

Almunia

Sagna-Gallas-Vermaelen-Gibbs

Diaby-Song-Fabregas

Nasri-van Persie-Arshavin

I suspect that’s what we’ll see, although it wouldn’t surprise if Eduardo started up front instead of Nasri, either. I suspect Eboue, Rosicky, and Ramsey could also see some action as well. It’s a strong lineup, and should be enough to see Wolves off.

Also, if you’ve got a few minutes, Tom Adams wrote a very, very good piece on Patrick Vieira and his importance to Arsenal FC over at ESPN Soccernet–I highly recommend checking it out. He says it better and in more detail than I will here, but Vieira really is an Arsenal legend (named by the fans as the 5th greatest Gunner of all time in the official site’s poll a few years back), and was really probably more important than anyone not named Thierry Henry in the successful Arsenal clubs of the late 90s and early 2000s–he gave the club a steel and a toughness that we have not been able to replace since he left. He was left out of the France squad for their upcoming playoff tie against the Republic of Ireland, and his international career could well be over.

Anyway, that’s about it. A win picks up ground on either Chelsea or United, if not both, and sends us into the international break with momentum on our side, which we’ll need since we square off with Chelsea on November 21. Have great weekends.

Come on Arsenal.