Why Arsenal will benefit from the World Cup break more than league rivals

Arsenal will use the World Cup break to get even further ahead in the Premier League.

Arsenal have 10 players playing in the FIFA World Cup. At first glance, this may seem like a lot but actually, of the players that have been selected to represent their countries, not many of them are consistent starters.

Only Thomas Partey, Granit Xhaka and Bukayo Saka strike me as players that will start for their countries on a consistent basis. Others, like Gabriel Jesus, William Saliba and Gabriel Martinelli will certainly get minutes, but there is plenty of competition in their positions.

For a full list of Arsenal players going to the World Cup, click here.

Why Arsenal benefit the most from this World Cup break

It is weird to say this but Arsenal’s biggest rivals in the Premier League this season are Manchester City. The Citizens have 16 players going to the World Cup, which is already more than Arsenal’s 10.

When you look at the players which are representing Manchester City in the competition – John Stones, Phil Foden, Kevin De Bruyne to name just a few – most of these players will start for their countries on a consistent basis.

While this doesn’t necessarily result in injuries, it will result in fatigue. The star players for City are expected to go far in the competition too. Cancelo, Dias and Silva will go far for Portgual, De Bruyne will go far for Belgium and Ederson will go far for Brazil.

And it doesn’t just stop at Manchester City. Let’s look at Spurs – Kane is England’s first choice, Perisic is Croatia’s first choice, Hojbjerg is Denmark’s first choice, Son is South Korea’s first choice. The list goes on.

The same can be said for Liverpool, Manchester United and Chelsea. All of their players going to the World Cup will play consistently. For Arsenal, it is very much luck that their players play for nations with a lot of competition.

All it takes is an injury or two, which comes from consistent game time, for the Gunners to get a head start on the second half of the season.

Where do you think Arsenal will finish in the Premier League this season?