Arsenal return to European competition for the first time in over 12 months on Thursday evening as they face FC Zurich in the Europa League Group Stages.
The Gunners are heavy favourites as they head to Swizterland to face Zurich, but as Chelsea have already shown this week, there’s no such thing as an easy game in Europe.
The north London outfit will need to be switched on if they’re going to get three points here, and while they should fancy their chances of getting a win, they need to treat this as they’d treat any other competitive fixture.
Of course, with a Premier League game against Everton on the horizon, there will be the temptation to rotate and rest players for this one as the football schedule kicks into overdrive over the next few weeks.
With that in mind, we’ve had a go at predicting Arsenal’s starting XI for this one.
We think that Mikel Arteta will rotate rather heavily, making no fewer than five changes from the team that lost to Manchester United at the weekend.
The defence is where most of the changes lie as only Ben White retains his place in the backline as William Saliba, Gabriel Magalhaes and Oleksandr Zinchenko drop out.
We would likely have seen rotation in the midfield if everyone was fit, but injuries to Thomas Partey and Mohamed Elneny see both Granit Xhaka and Albert Sambi Lokonga retain their places.
It’s a similar story on the wings as injuries to Emile Smith Rowe and Reiss Nelson force Bukayo Saka and Gabriel Martinelli to start here, while there is a change in the number 10 role as Fabio Vieira makes his full debut.
Eddie Nketiah leads the line on this occasion, giving Gabriel Jesus the chance to get some rest after his non-stop start to the season.
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