After 25 minutes as a trio in the MLS All-Star game, Martin Odegaard, Kai Havertz, and Declan Rice were all in the starting lineup for Arsenal in Saturday’s pre-season fixture against Manchester United.
Though Arsenal started the game strongly, it didn’t end up going to plan, with United winning the contest 2-0.
Despite the fact the three players haven’t even completed 90 minutes together yet, some pundits and supporters have already started to raise questions over whether they can fit in the same team.
Responding to those questions, Mikel Arteta pointed out that it’s not all going to come together instantly.
“When they play 55 times together, it will be better, it will flow better, they will understand each other better and we will be more dominant,” Arteta said.
“But things take time to glide and we have to respect that. But I saw a lot of positive things, things I really like much more than the game that we won although the result is very different.”
It’s going to be interesting to see how Arteta approaches the final few games of pre-season, on that front.
On the one hand, if the plan is to get Havertz, Odegaard, and Rice working together in the long term, then maybe you commit to giving them as many minutes as possible together.
Even if that means sacrificing a bit of pre-season momentum in the process.
But with the Community Shield game against Manchester City coming up, it’s also possible Arteta might start to think a bit more pragmatically about that match.
The safe option would probably be to revert to a team more similar to last season’s, with Rice replacing Granit Xhaka. Then Arteta could integrate other options slowly as the season goes on.
In the meantime, the pre-season friendly against Barcelona on Wednesday will probably involve a rotated side.
Arteta confirmed some players who “didn’t have any exposure” against United will be involved in the next friendly, so expect some changes.
