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Football London
Football London
Sport
Louie Chandler

Mikel Arteta has already been handed Manchester United lesson to help Arsenal beat Wolves

Arsenal will welcome Wolves to the Emirates Stadium in what looks set to be a significant moment in the race for the top four in the Premier League.

With Tottenham slipping up against Burnley on Wednesday night, Mikel Arteta now has the chance to open up a gap on both the Lilywhites and Wolves with a win in north London.

Three points would take the Gunners to within a point of Manchester United who currently occupy fourth. Even then, they will still boast two games in hand over Ralf Rangnick's men.

It is the Red Devils who have already delivered a valuable lesson that Arteta and his team would be wise to learn from ahead of kick-off tonight.

Bruno Lage has done a wonderful job since replacing Nuno Espirito Santo at Molineux. A number of impressive but unspectacular displays have left the west Midlands side flying under the radar and they now sit just two points behind the Gunners.

The result that arguably made the rest of the league take notice of them as contenders for the first time was a 1-0 victory against Manchester United at Old Trafford.

Wolves frustrated their opponents throughout the 90 minutes and punished them in the second half with a fine Joao Moutinho strike.

After the final whistle, Lage offered an insight into how his side were able to have so much success against the hosts, pointing to the positioning of full-backs Aaron Wan-Bissaka and Luke Shaw.

"The most important thing for us is to see where the full-backs are, which position they start in," Lage told Sky Sports after the game.

"[It is important] to find the spaces. When they're defending or attacking, where they are... In the first half, the space was outside. That's why Semedo and Marcal had a lot of chances, a lot of the ball, and the boys found those spaces."

Although Arsenal beat Wolves on the road just two weeks ago, this past insight from Lage could still be valuable.

With home advantage reversed the approach of both sides is likely to be different and if Wolves have targeted the full-backs of big-six opponents in the past, they will likely do so again.

It begs the question of how Arteta sets up. Does he keep the faith with Cedric Soares or revert to the reliable Takehiro Tomiyasu? Could he even ponder matching up the 3-4-3 formation so loved by Lage.

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