Southampton vs Arsenal – English Premier League – Preview

Posted on December 26, 2015 by Sreya

Arsenal travel to the south coast to face Southampton at the St. Mary’s Stadium in the late evening English Premier League fixture on Saturday. Arsenal, with their win over Manchester City last Monday, have an incredible opportunity to challenge for the Premier League this season as they are second on the league standings with thirty six points.

Southampton, who are going through a rough patch of form, are in the twelfth place with twenty-one points. Although the home side is extremely unlikely to cause an upset today, in one of the most open Premier League seasons of recent times, Arsenal’s visit to Southampton could prove to be an intriguing fixture because of the footballing philosophy adopted by managers of both clubs.

Team News

Fraser Forster has returned to training but is not expected to feature until 2016, having been injured for the last nine months. Florin Gardos and Jay Rodriguez are the other injury concerns for Ronald Koeman’s side.

Arsenal do not have any fresh injury casualties this past week, but will be without Alexis Sanchez, Francis Coquelin, Santi Cazorla, Tomas Rosicky, Mikel Arteta, Danny Welbeck and Jack Wilshere.

Southampton Possible Starting Lineup: Martin Stekelenburg, Cedric Soares, Jose Fonte, Virgil van Dijk, Ryan Bertrand, Victor Wanyama, Jordy Clasie, Sadio Mane, Steven Davis, Dusan Tadic, Graziano Pelle.

Arsenal Possible Starting Lineup: Petr Cech, Hector Bellerin, Per Mertesacker, Laurent Koscielny, Nacho Monreal, Mathieu Flamini, Aaron Ramsey, Joel Campbell, Mesut Ozil, Theo Walcott, Olivier Giroud.

Contibutor’s Pick

According to Head-2-Head statistics, the last six meeting between these two clubs have resulted in two wins apiece and two draws. The Saints’ form has nosedived of late, with Saints without a win in their last five, losing four.

According to WhoScored, the home side are unbeaten in their last four league meetings with Arsenal on home turf, though only one of those four matches has returned all three points. Arsenal, on the other hand, have lost only one of their last six league games and have won each of their last three.

The Gunners have also scored a minimum of two goals in their last three Premier League games, so they are the favorites to win this fixture, with 3-1 being the most probable scoreline.

“In attack we not only had Olivier Giroud. We also had Theo Walcott, Alexis Sanchez and Danny Welbeck who are world-class strikers. Competition exists if the numbers are not too short or not too big.”

– Arsene Wenger.