Ian Wright has backed Arsenal to come away from Chelsea with a 2-1 victory, with Mikel Arteta’s men ‘needing a win’ after an immensely disappointing run of results.
The Gunners sit fifth heading into the weekend’s Premier League action and could trail top-of-the-table Liverpool by ten points come kick-off at Stamford Bridge.
Having dropped points in each of their last three top-flight games, an out-of-sorts Arsenal are in desperate need of a morale-boosting performance in west London, though face a rejuvenated Chelsea with Enzo Maresca at the helm.
However, the visitors could be boosted by the return of their captain Martin Odegaard, who came on as a late substitute in the side’s Champions League defeat at Inter Milan on Wednesday night.
Arteta will likely be without defenders Riccardo Calafiori and Takehiro Tomiyasu in for the derby and England midfielder Declan Rice remains a doubt after missing Arsenal’s trip to Milan through injury.
‘We need to win, we need to win. We’re not scoring at the minute.’ ex-Arsenal striker Wright said while previewing the contest on the latest episode of The Overlap.
‘We’re normally pretty good at Chelsea. We normally do well but this Chelsea team has got a different swagger. I’m going to go 2-1 to Arsenal.’
Former Manchester United defender Gary Neville, meanwhile, believes the points will be shared in a closely contested 1-1 draw.
‘I’m doing that game, I can’t have a draw again! Probably will be a draw though, won’t it?’ Neville said.
‘I think 1-1, we’ll go with 1-1.’
Facing the media after Arsenal’s defeat to Inter Milan, a bullish Arteta insisted his side were more than capable of beat Chelsea if they replicated the same performance at Stamford Bridge.
‘If we play the way we played against Inter then we have a big chance to win against Chelsea,’ the Arsenal head coach told reporters at his post-match press conference.
‘That’s the way we have to go. I told them that I’m proud of them, I haven’t seen them play in Europe in the manner that we played today.
‘We are very disappointed because we didn’t get what we wanted out of the game, that’s for sure.’
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