Guess who’s coming to dinner?

Sunday is North London Derby Day! Will north London be red at the final whistle?

There is a lot on the line for both clubs as they line-up for their second encounter of the 2020/2021 season. Tottenham Hotspur won the first match 2-0 back in December on the Spurs home pitch.

Arsenal is coming off a 3-1 Europe League win in Athens, while Spurs easily defeated Dinamo Zagreb 2-0, again on their home pitch. Arsenal traveled 6,000 miles for their Athens game, so Jose Mourinho’s men have the advantage of no travel days to deal with.

Our north London rivals are currently 7 points ahead of the Gunners in the Premier League table, and Jose Mourinho wanted to make sure Gooners were made aware. Jose took this jab at Mikel Arteta’s team, “I look up, I don’t look down. If Arsenal was seven points ahead of us I would look to them but because we have seven points more than them, I don’t look down. At the same time, we look always to the next match and if instead of Arsenal it was Villa or Newcastle – exactly the same feeling. We feel we’re better than the position we have in the table and we want to improve our position.”

Arteta, on the other hand, was more diplomatic talking about Spurs when he told Arsenal.com, “They are very difficult because the level of quality, precision, understanding and chemistry they have between them makes them probably one of the most teams in Europe. They don’t need much. They are able to create their own chances, they are able to link as a team. So it’s really difficult to do that, but we’ll prepare the game well to try to stop them, obviously.”

Sunday will be Mourinho’s first trip to The Emirates as the Tottenham manager, however he is not a stranger to facing the Gunners in the the past. In fact, Arsenal have defeated “The Special One” only twice in 21 previous matches.

Harry Kane looks to be fit once again, so the Gunners could face a front of Gareth Bale, Heung-Min Son and Kane. Obviously, this will be a huge defensive test for Bernd Leno and his defensive front wall.

With that said, I have revised my Arsenal starting XI for Sunday. Here it is…

[4-2-3-1]

Lacazette

Aubameyang, Smith Rowe, Saka

Xhaka, Partey

Tierney, Luiz, Holding, Bellerin

Leno

I’ms sticking with my final score prediction…

Tottenham Hotspur 2 – ARSENAL 2

COYG!

Cheers.

Gunner1953