Happy Tuesday people. Have you fully recovered from the weekend’s emotional high? Or are you still drinking in all levels of content?

I think mine is just about starting to wear off, but mainly because we’re just over 48 hours until we are on to our next game away to Sporting Lisbon, a match which Arteta will have plenty of questions in his mind in terms of team rotation and who he decides to start. It’ll be a tough one, but I don’t think I’m ready to accept thinking about that game until the last-gasp victory from Saturday is completely worn off.

I also wonder what level of ‘acceptance’ Arsenal have with the supposed investigation that is going on this week at FA GQ, as the football’s governing body in this country decide whether or not they should punish the Arsenal players and staff for their behaviour. I mean, seriously, what else are they supposed to do? Score the goal and the simply walk back to the centre spot with a polite and gentle hand clap to the fans?

Never gonna happen. A goal like that will always result in the pandemonium that ensued and if the FA want to get their charge book out again to try to make another example of Arsenal this season, I’m sure Arsenal will just accept it and politely ask whether the same rules have been applied to pitch invasions at lower league clubs during this season. Probably not, because those pockets aren’t as deep as Arsenal and somebody at the FA probably needs a nice big, new, desk, for them to drop their many papers on.

No, the news that will probably concern Arsenal is the Trossard injury length, after he went off on Saturday with a groin injury. Arteta said at the time that it didn’t look great, that he felt something as he was running back towards our goal to defend one of the few Bournemouth attacks, that he wasn’t sure about the severity. But the Standard appear to have gotten wind that the injury isn’t as bad as is feared and that’s good to hear. What the article does say, which might be a slight concern, is that they hope he’ll be back before the international break. That’s only four  games between now and then – Sporting away and home, as well as Fulham away and Palace at home – and whilst you feel we might just be able to get through that period if it is just those couple of weeks, the fact that we also have Eddie out at this period of time, means we are really thin on the ground right now.

Gabriel Jesus took part in a warm down kick around on Saturday, which is great news, plus we had Smith Rowe get around 45 – 50 minutes at the weekend. I suspect he’ll be given another longer run out on Thursday – maybe from the bench for 30 minutes against Sporting – so we could potentially have cover, but depending on what Arteta says about Eddie, would suggest that we might have to try the Martinelli experiment again.

It kind of worked to an extent I thought. He had that blistering run where he just knocked the ball over the bar, he was involved in build up and certainly if you’re asking him to play off the shoulders or win a foot race with a centre half he might be very useful centrally, but whoever comes in for him wide left will have to show a level of consistency because Martinelli has been banging in goals from wide left over the last few weeks and we know how much Arteta prefers not to move his puzzle pieces around too much. I’m sure Arteta is hoping amongst hope that Eddie is fine for Thursday because I think Arteta might go strong – certainly in his front three – and I wonder if he’ll be wanting his usual front three of Martinelli, Nketiah and Saka to be out there in the Portuguese air on Thursday evening.

There are options for rotation though. Nelson may have only made a few cameos this season, but they have been effective; you certainly can’t really argue about his end product in the Forest game and then at the weekend. He’s made eight appearances in all competitions so far this season and has three goals and a couple of assists I think. That’s not bad going and in a season in which you want to win a major domestic trophy, you often need an unsung hero to step in for parts of the season. The likes of Manninger and Wreh have proven that in title winning seasons you need an unsung cameo appearance if you want to get over the line. Could Nelson be playing that role this season? Maybe. But it certainly feels at the moment as though he’s going to get a little more game time than we all thought a few weeks back when we signed Trossard and Smith Rowe was returning, that’s for sure.

I hope that it’s a sign. ‘Big’ Gabby was seen post the Bournemouth game to be pointing up to the heavens and saying something to Nelson. I hope it was him telling him that he has been chosen by god and that this was a sign from god. I’m not sure I believe it that much, but it is certainly a positive omen in what has been a great season so far.

We’ve had a number of weeks where Arteta has said there haven’t been many injuries other than the long term absentees like ESR and Gabriel Jesus and just when they look like they are getting back, it appears as though we’ve got a few other players in those positions just creaking a little bit. Hopefully it’s just me worrying unduly, but I’m going to be looking out for that pre-Lisbon press conference with an intrigued eye.

Catch you all tomorrow. Have a good one.