Alexis Sanchez will give Arsenal fans a first glimpse of his likely role in Arsene Wengers tactical blueprint for the season at Wembley on Sunday. The £33million World Cup star is expected to start as the lone striker in a 4-2-3-1 formation, where he was more effective than Olivier Girouds laboured scavenging in the Emirates Cup last weekend. Gunners boss Wenger is happier with the more fluid and interchangeable shape with the Chile striker as the focal point of Arsenals attack. And he accepts that Arsenal will deserve to be judged on their prospects for the coming season in the Community Shield against Manchester City - because their results against title rivals in 2013-14 were so poor. Wenger said: Of course you want to start strongly because we have the memory of what happened last year on the first day of the season, although it did not stop us from being top of the league for more than 100 days. I accept that, in the modern world, you are judged on every single game so I dont have a problem with us being judged on our performance on Sunday. We have an opportunity to show we have grown since the FA Cup final. Maybe we are not ready physically, but it will be a good test. Wenger confirmed German World Cup- winning trio Mesut Ozil, Per Mertesacker and Lukaz Podolski will return to training on Monday, but all three will miss the Premier League kick-off against Crystal Palace next weekend.
Posted on: Sat, 09 Aug 2014 05:35:01 +0000