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The new season of the Premier League kicked off on Friday with Manchester United defeating Leicester City 2-1 in a tight encounter at Old Trafford, and we have had some exquisite performances since then.
Richarlison made a wonderful debut for Everton, following his £50m transfer from Watford, with the Brazilian putting in a man-of-the-match performance with a brace against newly promoted Wolverhampton Wanderers at the Molineux.
Elsewhere, Chelsea showed an early statement of intent with a comprehensive 3-0 victory away to Huddersfield while Tottenham ground out a 2-1 win over Newcastle at the St James' Park.
It's been an interesting opening weekend to the Premier League, however, the showdown everyone is waiting for and undoubted match of the weekend will take place on Sunday at The Emirates as Arsenal hosts defending champions Manchester City.
The Cityzens are clear favorites to defend the Premier League owing to the emphatic nature in which they won it last season, but The Gunners are no shrinking violets themselves and will hold the belief that they can upset Guardiola's army at home.
Arsenal has one of the best home records in the league over the last three seasons, and on their day can defeat anyone at home, and on the strength of their home form, despite how daunting a challenge it seems, Manchester City can be defeated.
Unai Emery is tasting Premier League football for the first time, and will seek to restore Arsenal back to the upper echelons of English football, after the stagnation under Arsene Wenger. A good way to announce himself to the Premier League would be with a statement victory over Manchester City which would seriously dent their confidence this season. Here are three players Unai Emery should deploy to stop the juggernaut which is Man City.
#3 Lucas Torreira
Following a stellar performance as the lynchpin for the Uruguay defense at the World Cup, 22-year-old Lucas Torreira finalized a £25m move from Sampdoria in the Serie A to Arsenal in the Premier League.
The Uruguayan international is extremely efficient at ball recovering, and would be crucial to cleanly breaking up Manchester City's play.
Since he established himself as a regular for Sampdoria in the 2016/2017 season, Torreira has distinguished himself as a holding midfielder with enormous potential. He attempted the most tackles (198), most fouls (174) and most interceptions (158) in the Sampdoria team over the last two years, while he was one of only three players to have attempted more than 100 tackles in Serie A last season (along with Lucas Leiva and Allan), but he had the highest tackle win ratio of the trio (68.2%).
Despite standing at just 5-foot-6, Torreira makes up for what he lacks in height with an endless amount of commitment while putting his body on the line, and he is also a significant upgrade on Arsenal's current holding midfielder.
Torreira bossed the Swiss international in key stats last term. Whereas Xhaka averaged 2.1 tackles and 1.0 interceptions per 90 minutes last season in he Premier League, Torreira, in contrast, in Serie A, was at 2.8 tackles and 2.0 interceptions per 90 minutes.
He also goes about his business in a clean manner, receiving just 6 yellow cards in 33 appearances for Sampdoria last season unlike Xhaka who was booked 12 times in 48 appearances across all competitions.
City's possession based system means that a lot of their play runs through their midfield, and in David Silva, Kevin De Bruyne and Bernardo Silva, they have some of the most devastating midfielders in the world who could hurt any opponent, but with Torreira, Unai Emery has a potential antidote to limit their impact.
#2 Bernd Leno
Bernd Leno was signed in June by Arsenal from Bayer Leverkusen for £19.2m, and owing to the humongous amounts expended on goalkeepers since that time, the deal could prove to be a shrewd piece of business by the Gunners.
At 26, the German international has a lot of years of top-level goalkeeping left in him, and he comes highly recommended with one of the most burgeoning reputations, as a rising German goalkeeper.
He boosted his stock in the Bundesliga with Bayer Leverkusen, becoming the third goalkeeper in Bundesliga history to keep a clean sheet in his first three appearances, and a month later became the youngest German goalkeeper to feature in the Champions League when he made his UCL debut against Chelsea aged 19 years and 103 days.
He made a total of 233 league appearances for Leverkusen and was a part of the Confederations Cup winning team in 2017. He would have undoubtedly had more than his 6 international caps but for the reputations of those ahead of him (Manuel Neuer and Andre Ter Stegen).
Manchester City arguably has the best attack in the league, evidenced by the record 106 goals they scored last season (although Salah and Liverpool would have something to say about that), so stopping them from scoring is no mean feat, as they possess deadly forwards such as Sergio Aguero, Gabriel Jesus, Riyad Mahrez and Leroy Sane who are among the best at their positions in the world.
This is where a quality goalkeeper comes in, as he is the last line of defense after his defenders have been beaten, and if he is at the top of his game, Bernd Leno could be the difference between Arsenal conceding a bucketload and keeping the Man City attack at bay.
#1 Pierre-Emerick Aubammeyang
The Gabonese international is Arsenal's record signing, following his £56m transfer from Borussia Dortmund last January.
In Aubameyang, Arsenal have one of the best strikers in Europe, and he forged this reputation in Germany with Dortmund, where he scored 141 goals in 213 games across all competitions for the Signal Iduna Park outfit, including a 31-goal haul in the 2016/2017 season where he finished as the Bundesliga top scorer.
Likened to Arsenal legend Thierry Henry due to their similar playing pattern and speed, the 29-year-old Aubameyang impressed in his debut half season, scoring on his first game in an Arsenal shirt in the 5-1 rout of Everton in the Premier League, and ended the season with ten goals in just 13 league appearances.
As evidenced by Liverpool's victories against them last season, Manchester City's defenders struggle when put under pressure, as their highline defending forces them into committing errors, and much like Liverpool's fromt three, Aubameyang's pace could be destructive in hassling the City backline if Emery decides to adopt a pressing tactic or playing on the counter attack.
He is also an adept finisher with high positional awareness, so Otamendi and John Stones or whoever plays at the heart of the city defense would constantly be on their toes, as they wouldn't want to lose the 29-year-old, and this could play into Arsenal's hands, as a key component of City's passing game is their defenders having space and time to pass out from the back.
With Aubameyang leading the line, Unai Emery knows he has a lethal attacking weapon who needs just few chances to score, so the Spaniard would design his game tactics to suit Auba, which increases the chances of Arsenal securing victory.
