Will Wenger stick with three at the back?

A lot depends on how Arsène Wenger decides to approach the Manchester City game tactically and he is a manager who generally sticks to his core principles. Before this season, Arsenal had two wins and two draws against City over the previous two league seasons plus a win in the Community Shield. They beat City 2-0 at the Etihad Stadium in January 2015 when Santi Cazorla, still injured, was outstanding.

It was interesting to see Wenger switch to a three-man defence against Middlesbrough on Monday. Managers make sudden changes like that when they have the time to work on it in training, as Arsenal did, and also to refocus the minds of players on the job in front of them.

It also felt like he was trying it out with tomorrow’s FA Cup semi-final in mind, and perhaps the win against Middlesbrough will convince him that it is the right way to go against a much better opponent. I rate Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain (left) as a wing-back. In fact, I think he has the kind of versatility that Antonio Valencia has demonstrated in switching from winger to full-back. There is inevitably a lot of focus on Alexis Sánchez, and his effect on the other players. I have to say that I would like to have played alongside him. He gets upset when the team lose. He demands high standards of his team-mates. There is nothing wrong with that. Sánchez likes to lead the press and you can sometimes see him waving his team-mates forward to join him, and how Arsenal tackle that side of the game will be a major part of whether they are successful or