Before we get on to today’s task against West Ham at home, a word on the draw for the Champions League, which see’s us up against PSV in the Round of 16, with victory in that tie meaning we’d be up against either Atletico Madrid or Real Madrid. A win there takes us to the semi finals and it would be one of PSG, Liverpool, Villa or Club Brugge. I suspect Villa will get beyond the Belgians and whilst PSG are a decent side, we showed that we can dispatch them, so I suspect Liverpool will too. So if I’m hazarding a guess, getting beyond PSV would mean Real Madrid in the quarters and then Liverpool in the semi final. Looking at the other side of the draw it’s certainly the harder side of it and if we’d have been on the other side and been playing Feyenoord I’d have fancied our chances a lot more, as that route would have been the other Dutch side, Bayern (which I’d fancy us this time around), then Barcelona. Whilst Barca are a very good side, they’re a young side who do concede goals and so again, I’d have thought we might be able to stand a big chance of getting through over them.

There’s also the familiarity of PSV. It feels like we’re always within a season or two of playing them and last season he had them in the group stages. It’s a bit boring playing a side like that who you’ve played a few times before. But it is what it is, we have to get through that first leg and hope to do the business in the second, because by the time the quarter finals come around we might have a few more attackers to draw on.

Not this weekend though, as Arteta confirmed what we all already knew, which was that no players are back for us for the visit of West Ham. Ben White is fit and ready to go, but I suspect Timber keeps his place and so too will Lewis-Skelly at left back I’d imagine. I wouldn’t be completely against seeing Calafiori there though. As good as MLS has been and as much as he warrants his place, you wonder about that dynamism and driving into the opposition half that Calafiori has. He tee’d up Trossard to put in the assist/cross for Merino for our second goal last weekend against Leicester. He’s a guy who has already bagged a couple in the League this season and was unlucky to be marginally offside with his goal against Girona. MLS has a great goal against City, but Calafiori is that little bit more experienced and has a little bit more presence in the final third and at a time in which we’re needing of contribution for goals all over the pitch, I kind of feel like having him in might be a good idea.

The rest of the team will have a similar feeling to it this afternoon, I suspect, with the rest of the back four picking itself in the shape of Raya, Gabriel and Saliba. Odegaard will play right eight, Nwaneri right wing, then Rice will play, but exactly where is where it starts to get interesting. I listened to the Arsenal Vision podcast and Tim made an interesting point; we could see Merino AND Sterling today. Everyone is making the assumption that it is a binary choice between the two, but it wouldn’t surprise me to see Arteta give Sterling ‘one last chance’ today. He had an absolute stinker against Leicester and in the immediate aftermath I was certainly saying that’s him ‘washed’ but where we are right now, with very few attacking options, it seems annoyingly churlish to just burn a senior pro. He doesn’t deserve a start, his performances this season have certainly shown that, but Arteta can’t really afford to leave him completely out in the cold and so he will surely get minutes today. The question is whether it is from the start or not. Do you recognise that Merino playing from the start might not be the panacea many of us Arsenal fans thought after his brilliant impact from the bench a week ago? I wrote about the fact I think we need to be careful of crowning Merino our new ‘Big Target Man’ earlier in the week and whilst I am kind of hoping that we see him from the start today because the Sterling option hurt my eyes last week, I’m not completely convinced that a) Arteta will go for it from the start, and b) that he won’t look to try to rehabilitate Sterling from the off.

It’s a tough one. Neither option is optimal for us if we’re honest. But West Ham will look to come to us and frustrate today, so we need to be different to Leicester City last weekend. They sat in deeper in the second half, let’ us have the ball, asked the question of us to break them down and it wasn’t until the last ten minutes of normal time that we did it. West Ham lost to Brentford last weekend but the timing of that goal set the narrative and probably doesn’t tell you a lot about today. Brentford scored on four minutes and so the remainder of the game would be West Ham having to chase and Brentford being to hit in transition and knowing West Ham would open up. Today West Ham will be looking to frustrate us in front of goal. If we score early, you’d fancy our chances, but with Potter adopted a three at the back system, I can see this being a deep West Ham looking to spring traps with long switches to the likes of Bowen and Kudus. We need to be ready for it.

And we need our big players stepping up. The likes of Odegaard need to be getting on the ball and threading the eye of a needle. Having Merino as a target option is fine, but West Ham will probably happily cede the wings in defence if it means we’re crossing balls in to him with an army of West Ham bodies around him. We might need to find other solutions. What those are beats me, but that’s why I’m in the stands, not in the dugout.

I’ll be heading along there to take my usual seat in Block Five, but until then, have yourselves a good day and let’s hope for all three points. Any lingering hope of the title need it.