Gunners turn to youth for cup clash

ARSENE WENGER will field a youthful line-up alongside some older heads as Arsenal aim to avoid an unthinkable shock in the Carling Cup third round against Shrewsbury tonight.

The League Two side could hardly have picked a better time to play the Gunners, who are shipping goals at an alarming rate.

Wenger has confirmed he will give a debut to Korean striker Park Chu-Young, while Japanese forward Ryo Miyaichi and fellow 18-year-old Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain can also expect to make their first starts.

Wenger said: “I will be faithful to our policy but I will try to find a good mixture between youth and experience.

“You will see the likes of Ryo and Oxlade-Chamberlain. You should be excited about Oxlade-Chamberlain because he is a great talent.

“My target is to develop him so he confirms the expectation I have for him.”

The players with greater experience likely to feature at the Emirates include Andre Santos and Marouane Chamakh, while Emmanuel Frimpong, Carl Jenkinson and Francis Coquelin may also play.

While Wenger maintains he can turn things round, former Arsenal manager George Graham yesterday added to the doubts about Arsenal’s defence saying: “It should be better, I don’t think it could get much worse.”

Graham, who built a miserly back four at Arsenal which survive a decade, told BBC he was worried when he saw Wenger bring in five new faces at the end of August.

He said: “I think they left it a bit late to bring in all these players. Two weeks of the season had gone by, and he’s not had time to work with the players he’s brought in.

“Especially among the defence. He’s bought a new left-back [Santos], a new centre-half (Mertesacker].

“Defensively they’ve not had enough time to work with the back four.”

Meanwhile captain Robin van Persie says Arsenal still have time to turn their season around despite the club’s worst league start for 58 years.

Van Persie told the club’s website: “At some point you need to pick yourself up and prove what you are capable of. We are not doing that and are not consistent enough.

“We have to get back-to-back wins. We just need a couple of good weeks in the Premier League where we get a lot of points, and hopefully we can start next week against Bolton.”