Arsenal team news Vs Cardiff: New centre-back pairing for the night

A look at the team news for the Premier League action against Cardiff City. 

Unai Emery’s side were on a roll during their 21-game unbeaten run and in touching distance of the fourth-placed Chelsea. Since the defeat to Southampton which ended the unbeaten run, they have been very shaky producing inconsistent displays.

The defence has been going for a toss and their performance once again came into highlight when they faced Manchester United in the FA Cup on Friday. It has been that kind of a season with many individual mistakes being punished by the opponents.

From putting in an excellent display against Chelsea at the Emirates to losing to Manchester United with a span of five days, the Gunners’ inconsistency has come back to haunt them more often than not.

The London outfit are just three points away from their rivals Chelsea, leaving the Gunners with a fantastic opportunity to close down the gap to one point for at least another 24 hours as Chelsea play Bournemouth on Wednesday night.

TEAM NEWS: 

Not only did Unai Emery lose against Manchester United, but the injury blows to Laurent Koscielny and Sokratis Papastathopoulos has put the Spaniard in a bit of a headache ahead of a crucial game against Cardiff City to bolster their confidence. They have joined the injury list which already consists of Hector Bellerin, Rob Holding, and Danny Welbeck.

The Gunners are expected to make two changes with Shrokdan Mustafi and Dinos Mavropanos walking into the starting eleven for the injured duo. The Gunners boss also confirmed that Koscielny has not broken his jaw and Sokratis will be out for two weeks at least.

Speaking in the pre-match press conference, Unai Emery said “[Koscielny and Sokratis] are not OK for tomorrow. But it is good news for example for Laurent Koscielny because he didn’t break his jaw.”

“Sokratis doesn’t have a big injury but he isn’t OK [to face Cardiff], I don’t know how long but I think maybe two or three weeks.

“Mavropanos has been working with us for the past month and has playing with the under-23s. He is in the squad with the possibility to play.

“Our challenge every day, every match, is to take a better balance in the attacking and defensive moments. We are scoring a lot, that’s a good statistic, but we are receiving a lot more [goals against] than we want.

Matteo Guendouzi is expected to fare in the starting eleven instead of Alex Iwobi, with Lucas Torreira and Aaron Ramsey expected to start in advanced positions.

STARTING ELEVEN: Leno, Maitland-Niles, Mustafi, Mavropanos, Kolasinac, Xhaka, Guendouzi, Ramsey, Torreira, Aubameyang, Lacazette.

However, Arsenal have been handed a huge boost as their attacker Henrikh Mkhitaryan has been training with the first team this week and is expected to get some minutes against Cardiff City.