The Premier League weekend concludes with the Monday Night Football where yet another London derby takes place as Arsenal host Crystal Palace in what is a return to the Emirates Stadium of Patrick Vieira.
Arsenal have recovered from a terrible start to the season and will be looking to continue to make positive strides in this match, while Palace are a work in progress under Vieira and get the chance to show further improvement here.
Where to watch
The match will be shown as part of the Monday Night Football programme which is on the Sky Sports Main Event and Sky Sports Premier League channels. The show begins at 7pm with kick off at the Emirates Stadium at 8pm.
Arsenal
When Arsenal lost their opening three matches without looking very good in any of them there were questions being asked about just how bad a season this could be for the Gunners. To their credit they have turned things around nicely and are undefeated in their last four matches. I wouldn’t say they look as convincing as you would expect an Arsenal side to look, but they have picked up 10 points from their last four outings and you can’t criticise that too much.
It should be said that two of those Arsenal defeats were against two of the top three in the league table but at the same time two of their three wins were against two of the bottom three in the standings so we might still be waiting to see exactly what this Arsenal side are. Their five goals in seven matches is a concern to be, especially as three of them came in the same game against a Tottenham side who have been equally as unconvincing.
Crystal Palace
While it hasn’t been an inspiring beginning to the season for Crystal Palace, the only teams who have beaten them so far are Chelsea and Liverpool, and they gave the latter plenty of problems in that match. The opposite end of the scale is they have only won one of their matches and that came against that very hit and miss Tottenham team, although to be fair to Palace they dominated Brighton a couple of games ago but couldn’t put their rivals away.
There is a more possession based outlook about this Palace side, one which looks to win the ball a lot higher than under Roy Hodgson and that takes time to have a maximum effect so I would suggest Palace are going along quite nicely. Their 11 goals against is a concern but when you consider that six of those came at the hands of Chelsea and Liverpool it isn’t a bad record. Palace just need that defining result on their travels to give them the confidence and belief to move forward with their new style.
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Team News
Arsenal are going to assess the players who have been away on international duty ahead of picking their side for this match but with this being the Monday night game you wouldn’t think any of them will miss out here. Granit Xhaka will though as he is injured.
Crystal Palace are not expected to have any new injury concerns going into this match so Patrick Vieira just needs to decide on which attackers to use. They remain without Eberechi Eze who is a long-term injury victim.
Betting
Arsenal haven’t really convinced me all season and if I was forced to I would back Crystal Palace to get a result of some kind from this match but they are still a work in progress themselves so instead I’ll pick out a couple of value player bets that could yield a nice return over the course of the evening. There is no doubt that Takehiro Tomiyasu is an upgrade on what Arsenal have had at right-back in the past but he is essentially a centre-back who has transitioned into that position and lacks the pace to keep Wilfried Zaha under control in this match. Nobody is fouled more in the Premier League this season than Zaha and his speed and control can tease the Japanese player into challenges he has no control in. With him unlikely to receive help from the player in front of him or the central defender inside him Tomiyasu could easily find himself exposed against Zaha so the 7/2 he gets booked looks massive.
Talking of looking massive, the 9/1 on Michael Olise to register an assist in the match looks huge. If we think back to the opening day of the season, Arsenal looked a shambles against anything that came into their box and they haven’t really improved as the season has gone on. Olise has only made appearances from the subs bench so far this season but he impresses each time he does so. He scored off the bench against Leicester last time out and it was his cross from which Jeffrey Schlupp scored the equaliser from so that 9/1 on the EFL player of the season from last term to contribute to a goal looks overpriced.
Tips
Back T.Tomiyasu to be booked for a 1/10 stake at 4.50 with William Hill
Back M.Olise to assist a goal for a 1/10 stake at 10.00 with William Hill
Back them here:
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