Arsenal look to bounce back from a first defeat of the season against Nottingham Forest as the Premier League returns from the international break.
Victory would lift Arsenal to the top of the table before Chelsea play on Saturday evening, whilst Forest can leapfrog Mikel Arteta’s Gunners into third with a win.
Team News
Piero Hincapie could make his debut for Arsenal following his loan move from Bayer Leverkusen, and is expected to replace William Saliba who suffered an ankle injury during warmup in their defeat at Liverpool.
Christian Norgaard and Ben White (both knock) are expected to be available for selection.
Bukayo Saka (hamstring), Kai Havertz and Gabriel Jesus (both knee) remain sidelined.
Forest will be without shock deadline day loan signing, Oleksandr Zinchenko because he is ineligible to face his parent club.
Ola Aina (unspecified) is a doubt but Nicolas Dominguez (knee) remains ruled out.
John Victor, Nicolo Savona Cuibano and Dilane Bakwa could make their debuts for Forest.
When is Kick-Off?
Arsenal host Forest at the Emirates Stadium on Saturday 13 September at 12:30pm BST, live on TNT Sports 1 in the UK.
Stat Attack
- Arsenal have lost one of their last five meetings against Forest (W3, D1, L1).
- Forest are yet to record a Premier League victory away at Arsenal’s current home – Emirates Stadium (L3).
- Forest’s new manager, Ange Postecoglou is yet to beat Arsenal in all competitions across four previous meetings (D1, L3).
- Arsenal have kept clean sheets in two of their three matches so far this season (W2, L1).
- Forest have avoided defeat in four of their five league visits to London-based clubs in 2025 (W2, D2, L1).
Prediction
Having lacked a clinical final touch in their defeat at Liverpool before the international break, Arsenal now have the perfect chance to reset and be more composed in their finishing to build early momentum at the start of a busy period for the club now the Champions League is set to get underway on Tuesday.
Forest meanwhile are an unknown quantity coming into this game with Ange Postecoglou now in charge following Nuno Espirito Santo’s exit, but this is a difficult enough game for them without having to adapt to Postecoglou’s high-pressing style from a well-built counter-attack that they’re used to.
As good as it would be for Forest to get a new manager bounce and pick up a result, I do think that Arsenal will be too strong for them as their priority is putting in a better performance than they did against West Ham and adapting to their new style.
Prediction: Arsenal 2-0 Forest
Result: Arsenal 3-0 Forest
Leave a Reply