The Game

After ending the Asia Tour with an easy win and a disappointing draw, Arsenal’s pre-season continues today as we travel to Germany to face FC Cologne.

With Gervinho and Lukasz Fabianski both in the squad, this will of course be our first opportunity to see the former Lille man for the first time in an Arsenal jersey and to understand what his natural position since it seems there is a cloud of uncertainty hanging over his position on the pitch.

As it was the case last week, Denmark’s Nicklas Bendtner and Spain’s Manuel Almunia were left behind with manager Arsene Wenger yet again saying that the two are negotiating with other clubs and that therefore their future will probably be away from London, next season.

As for the local side, I don’t know much about them but it seems that in the German Bundesliga they never managed to finish above the tenth place in these last couple of decades although in all fairness they do possess some interesting players in their line-up like Lukas Podolski and Portugal’s Petit so who knows, this one might as well turn out to be an important test for us.

And, until you wait for kick-off, check out Arsene Wenger’s latest on transfers, why the future of Samir Nasri is yet to be sorted out and also why Emmanuel Frimpong needs to practice more at FIFA 2011 if he is to reach the level of Theo Walcott and Vito Mannone.

As always, please do join the discussion in our chat room which will also be active after the full time whistle. You will be glad to know that from this season, to provide a better chat experience to our readers, users can be banned if they post offensive comments.

Streaming Links

For those who don’t know where to watch the game, maybe we can help, follow this link for streaming options. Links are updated before and during the match.

The Line-Ups

FC Cologne

Rensing, Brecko, Geromel, Mohamad, Andrezinho, Riether, Lanig, Chihi, Jajalo, Podolski, Novakovic

Subs: Coming Soon

Arsenal

Szczesny, Jenkinson, Gibbs, Koscielny, Vermaelen, Walcott, Ramsey, Song, Wilshere, Gervinho, Chamakh

Subs: Coming Soon

Half-Time Thoughts and Analysis

As the chat room has grown in popularity, my half-time thoughts as well as the comments of other Arsenal fans are now being discussed in the Arsenal Interactive chat room to which you can find a link at the bottom of this page. Please feel free to join the fun and share your point of view.