He is

Although I think if they played together more they would have been a decent pair. Read Pers comments about holding in his book.

I think I may have been too harsh on Mertesacker back in the day who was decent but didn’t have the right players next to him.

Holding, Tierney and Bellerin back this month. That’s huge

I just don’t see how you can say that at this point of Holding’s career. Hopefully he’ll realise whatever potential he has. But to claim he’s already better than Mertesacker was is in my view nothing short of barmy.

Germany’s first choice centre half for ten years. World Cup winner.

I shall be highly delighted if Holding gets to anywhere near that level.

If Keane is getting games for England won’t be long till a call up beckons

A bit early for the liquor no?

So, very early days in his fledgling career then. Watch this space with fingers crossed.

Are you saying Mustafi is better.

Lacazette being reported as out with an ankle injury until October.

Hopefully early October. Was he injured playing for France?

Apparently not.

This has now appeared on the Arsenal website

Alex Lacazette
Left ankle. After assessments to an ongoing ankle issue, we have advised that Alex will need to rest and strengthen his ankle to regain full fitness. Alex has been playing through this injury for several weeks. He is likely to be back in action in October.

Per feels like a proper Arsenal man. Gets it, gets what the club is about. That is really important. You sensed he took his responsibilities seriously as a captain and he seems to have taken that even further with his new role.

Thanks for that LTG.

Darren, I reckon you’re right in your last post.

A true professional and champ.

2019? :(

Thanks for clarifying. I am quite excited by our squad. and the general feeling of progress.

Out for a walk this morning and down in a creek gully I saw a feral cat playing around . Went down to investigate & the cat run off. Took a quick backwards step when I made out the snake which was hard to see. Have a look at this photo and you can see how hard it is to often see them. Thought it was probably just a yellow belly but sometimes , after hibernation even some of the more dangerous snakes can have a yellow colour. leave them alone is always the best policy unless you have a shovel handy.

Morning Bern,

It is great news. You might be surprised to know that despite my reservations about Mert as a player I have always really liked him as a person, at least from the interviews I have seen him give, both as a player and coach.

I hope that he does really well in his new position.

Morning Darren,

Yep, he has that aura about him.

I am sure that comment is a little bit tongue-in-cheek TG.

I haven't seen anything yet from Holding that makes me think he will be a worldbeater. I hope he does become one but I wouldn't put money on it.

To me he seems quite good at all aspects of the game without really excelling in any one area. He's pretty good on the ball but from what I have seen so far I wouldn't say he's especially quick or strong, particularly great in one-v-ones or an amazing reader of the game.

It's early days of course and I hope he proves me wrong big time.

Morning Socrates. You didn’t mention his heading ability, which is another feature of his game that from the evidence so far I see as okay or reasonable rather than outstanding. Like you, and from earlier comments others including DHD and dec, I hope he turns into a world beater. But, and it’s a big but, if Arsenal is to become a superb defensive outfit again, my guess is that Holding will be an adequate squad back up rather than a first team regular.

He has his 24th birthday next Friday (the 20th September) so he’s no longer a kid. If he was going to be a world beater I would have expected him to have shown a bit more by now, even with his injury record. Think of the likes of Sol Campbell, Tony Adams, John Terry and Rio Ferdinand, all English central defensive world beaters. Each and every one of them was miles ahead of where Rob Holding is at his age.

I find it amazing that some people are actually questioning Pépé. I mean the kid has only played a couple of games and he's not yet fully fit. He looks to have pace and amazingly quick feet so in my opinion the signs are very promising.

Whether he can have the impact of a Salah or Sane only time will tell but he looks to me like he could be the real deal.

Like so many other aspects of his game he looks decent in the air without being outstanding. I would expect him to have a very good PL career but have yet to see much evidence that he will become one of the top PL CBs. Some fans are seeing him as the man to turn around our defensive fortunes but I am not sure quite what that level of expectation is based on.

I am more excited to see if Tierney can make a big difference. Now Monreal has gone I think we only have one proper LB in the club (Kola is a wingback) which is a bit of a concern.

Didn't we go 20+ games unbeaten with Sockratis and Holding at CB?

So who plays up front ?

Aubameyang can’t be a expected to play every minute of every game for the next 6 weeks.

Nelson as some kind of unorthodox striker ? Pépé ?

Believe it or not Gunfire, Mustafi started and played sixteen of that unbeaten run. I’ve said a few times, he had a really good first half of last season.

I watched the Channel 5 highlights of the second day’s play of the fifth England v Australia test at the Oval. Steve Smith was out yesterday for 80. They said that was his lowest score of the series.

Blimey, if the nearest he’s come to a failed score this series is 80, what a series he’s had.

And its largely been a bowlers' series. Smith's average for the series is nearly 70 runs higher than that of the next player.

Yesterday he’d scored more than twice as many runs as Ben Stokes, the player who has scored the second most runs in the series.

Not a good day football results wise. Tottenham, Chelsea, Manchester United and Liverpool all won.

City are 2-1 down though at half time away to Norwich. Aguero pulled one back on the stroke of half time, which has to be have Norwich feeling a bit gutted and you get the feeling they’re going to reel them in. But we aren’t really competing with City, much more the teams you mentioned bar Liverpool. Still, come on you Canaries!!

You never know, Ash. Stranger things have happened, as any Leicester fan will tell you.

The last thing we want is for a situation to arise where the big two founder while someone else (heaven forbid, Spurs) is there to pick up the pieces.

True. But I can’t see it. I think we could start motoring come the new year with Bellerin Holding and Tierney back and established but it’ll come a bit too late to catch Liverpool who look untouchable Atm. Man City are now 3-1 down! So I guess that counts as foundering for them.

City coming unstuck against Norwich [touch wood] is exactly why the EPL is still a great competition. Thinking back to our wins in 1989 and 1998 ... if memory serves, Liverpool and then Manure looked pretty invincible back then ... I doubt many Arsenal fans saw either of those coming.

I take the point of Ash that we’re more in competition with Tottenham. Chelsea and Manchester United than City and Liverpool. But as I’m one of the people who much prefer City to Liverpool, I’m disappointed that City are 3-1 down at Norwich even though I don’t want either club to remain unbeaten.

I did in the 1988/89 season. I hardly ever bet but at the beginning of the season I felt we were a mega strong outfit and put a tenner on us to win the league. It wasn’t a fortune but back then £10 was worth a lot more than it is now. Got odds of 16/1.

As you say anything could happen. I think we’ve got so much upside with more to come but with obvious weak spots atm. In defence obviously but also still to find balance in midfield which will just hinder us until it’s a bit too late. Taking the example of Leicester for their more modest ability had no obvious weak spots and played to their strengths. Out of interest what was their points total that year? My guess would be around the 80-85 mark

I didn’t know but just looked it up. Leicester got 81 points in the 2015/16 season. We were second with 71 points, 10 behind.

Was listening to the end of the Norwich v City game on the radio, and the comm noted that one of the home defenders had 'quite literally an old head on young shoulders'. Isn't that amazing, I had no idea that head transplants were a thing.

Did he have Wayne Rooney face?

Win 11-0 today, and we will be second on goal difference

Now to await the first defeat for Pool.

After a terrible start to the season, perhaps somewhat surprisingly after their very good 2018/19, Watford changed their manager around a week ago. That possibly makes today’s game more difficult than Watford’s start might suggest. I’ll be happy with any sort of win, whether it comes after we played badly but got an undeserved penalty via a terrible VAR decision, an incompetent own goal, or whatever.