As usual, it\u2019s team selection, rotation and injuries that dominate the Scout Notes.<\/p>\n
ARTETA EXPLAINS HIS ROTATION<\/p>\n
Bukayo Saka<\/strong> (\u00a310.4m) didn\u2019t start on Saturday, then, but neither did Jurrien Timber<\/strong> (\u00a35.6m),\u00a0Thomas Partey<\/strong> (\u00a34.9m), Martin Odegaard\u00a0<\/strong>(\u00a38.2m) or\u00a0Gabriel Martinelli<\/strong> (\u00a36.5m). All of them were among the substitutes at Goodison Park.<\/p>\n Mikel Arteta might have talked a good talk in his pre-match presser<\/a> about concentrating on Everton and not thinking about Real Madrid, but actions spoke louder than words. When the teamsheets were exchanged, it was clear where the focus was.<\/p>\n Arteta claimed the Gunners had \u201cfour issues\u201d that influenced his selection (presumably Partey, Odegaard and Martinelli alongside the known one of Timber), although you\u2019d imagine all of them would have started had something meaningful been riding on Saturday\u2019s clash.<\/p>\n \u201cCertain players could not start the game. After Fulham, we had four issues, on top of all the issues that we already had. So we had to be very mindful because we have a lot of games coming up right now.\u201d \u2013 Mikel Arteta to BBC Sport<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n \u201cThere were four players that couldn\u2019t start the game after what happened with Fulham, and obviously the injury of Gabi, so that forces you as well to make some changes. As well, players deserve to play minutes, so I\u2019m very happy with that. Everybody has to be important, has to feel important. They have so many games coming up right now, and we have to rely on all of them.<\/p>\n \u201c[The decision to rotate was] not for what was happening on Tuesday but because some of them haven\u2019t trained, they haven\u2019t had the opportunity to start the game.\u201d \u2013 Mikel Arteta in his post-match presser<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n \u201cWe managed to give minutes to a lot of players and rest some players.\u201d \u2013 Mikel Arteta to TNT Sports<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n The big question now: what does Arteta do in Gameweek 32? The league title is gone (if it wasn\u2019t already), while the visit of Brentford is sandwiched by the Real double-header. It is, at least, a Tuesday-Saturday-Wednesday turnaround and not Wednesday-Saturday-Tuesday, but there\u2019ll be plenty of game-time uncertainty for the next Premier League fixture all the same.<\/p>\n ARTETA ON SAKA\u2019S FITNESS<\/p>\n Saka instead came on at half-time of this match. He and Martinelli replaced Ethan Nwaneri<\/strong> (\u00a34.6m) and Raheem Sterling<\/strong> (\u00a36.7m) at the break, building on his half-hour in midweek.<\/p>\n \u201cHe\u2019s in a much better place. Obviously, we have built that up, he played 30 minutes [against Fulham]. Today he\u2019s played 49, a little bit less, because we saw the end of the game, and after that he will be in a much better place.\u201d \u2013 Mikel Arteta on whether Bukayo Saka can start in midweek<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n A couple of blocked efforts from distance, one a free-kick, were all that Saka could muster. He wasn\u2019t alone in being quiet, however, with none of Arsenal\u2019s attackers really standing out.<\/p>\n The changes didn\u2019t help but maybe we need to give Everton credit, too, as they had suffocated Liverpool in a similar manner in midweek.<\/p>\n Leandro Trossard<\/strong> (\u00a36.8m) fired Arsenal in front and was denied a second by Jordan Pickford<\/strong> (\u00a35.1m), <\/strong>who also thwarted Martinelli. Odegaard, meanwhile, missed the best of the Gunners\u2019 chances late on but it was all a bit stale overall.<\/p>\n MERINO UPDATE<\/p>\n Trossard led the line on Saturday, with Nwaneri and Sterling (and later Saka and Martinelli) flanking him.<\/p>\n That meant that Mikel Merino<\/strong> (\u00a36.1m) was moved back into midfield, as he was midway through the game against Fulham. Not as appealing as an FPL asset when he\u2019s not \u2018out of position\u2019 up front, the Spaniard did still at least have a couple of headed efforts.<\/p>\n\n
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<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A much-changed Arsenal conceded more ground in the title \u2018race\u2019 on Saturday \u2013 not that it\u2019s now anything…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3178,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[1850,1851,1852,1853,1854,1855,1856,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-3177","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-arsenal-rotation","9":"tag-merino","10":"tag-merino-injury","11":"tag-saka","12":"tag-saka-fit","13":"tag-saka-injury","14":"tag-saka-start","15":"tag-sports","16":"tag-uk","17":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114289768166012766","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3177","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3177"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3177\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3178"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3177"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3177"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3177"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}