Arsenal at Leicester City match thread: the Chumbawumba Cup

Arsenal travel to Leicester City today to take on the Foxes in the Carabao Cup 3rd round. The Gunners have struggled at the King Power, amassing a poor 1-2-3 record since the Foxes returned to the Premier League in 2014. Of course, no fans in the stadium because of COVID-19 makes it a different story.

Arsenal have only won the League Cup twice in club history: 86-87 and 92-93. With the final coming at the end of February, Mikel Arteta needs to win this one to keep up his 1 trophy every 30-odd matches record.

Here are my hopes for today’s match, in order of importance: no injuries, squad rotation / minutes for younger players, actually winning the match. We say it every year but in this condensed, fixture-congested season it rings even more true: taking matchdays off the calendar by going out of a cup competition would not be the worst thing in the world. As a reminder, I always want Arsenal to win, but today, not winning would be significantly less unfortunate.

FYI: if the match is tied after 90 minutes, it goes straight to penalties.

Both Cedric Soares and Kieran Tierney are being held out today for precautionary reasons. Sokratis misses out with a calf injury. Emile Smith Rowe is out with a shoulder injury, which is a bummer because I bet he would have started if he were fit. The long-term injuries are unchanged. Leicester will be without fullback Ricardo Pereira and centerbacks Jonny Evans and Filip Benkovic.

Lineups
Arsenal - Leno, Holding, Luiz, Kolasinac, Maitland-Niles, Elneny, Willock, Saka, Pepe, Nelson, Nketiah

Leiceseter - Ward, Morgan, Fuchs, Albrighton, Choudhury, Dewsbury-Hall, Thomas, Gray, Maddison, Iheanacho

WHAT: Arsenal at Leicester City, Carabao Cup 3rd round
WHERE: King Power Stadium
WHEN: Wednesday, September 23rd 11:45 AM PT | 2:45 PM ET | 7:45 PM BT
US TV: Streaming on ESPN+.

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