After a sizeable international break, Arsenal return this weekend to a fixture schedule that will be daunting (as it always, always is nowadays). This is the part of the season where the dust begins to settle, some injuries will naturally take hold and each team has to adapt as the variability of the football season really begins to kick in. Here are three things I have my eye on ahead of the next block. The cavalry Arsenal played some flowing football in the opening weeks of the season with Saka, Odegaard and Havertz reunited for consecutive games. I don’t think Arsenal have played with greater freedom because of the psychological boost of being league champions, I think it is because their most technically gifted players have been available. However, in the opening block of the season, you tend to find that teams are able to establish rhythm in selection- especially before European campaigns begin. As summer gives way to autumn, that tends to be less the case. Injuries and the schedule mean that managers have to mix things up personnel wise. Kai Havertz and Christos Tzolis were injured playing for their countries. This immediately makes Viktor Gyokeres and Eberechi Eze key players. Likewise, Noni Madueke has been an incredibly peripheral figure in the opening weeks and that will almost certainly change. Madueke was omitted from Thomas Tuchel’s England squad for this international round despite starting four games during the World Cup. Meanwhile, Myles Lewis Skelly did not make the cut during the summer but started three of England’s four games and flourished. Lewis Skelly is an excellent example to some of the aforementioned, his early season form reduced the impact of Bruno Guimaraes’ early season fitness struggles. Madueke will want his England spot back. Eze needs to prove himself a viable left-wing option. Martin Zubimendi has become something of a forgotten man due to the form of Myles and the signing of Bruno. Mikel Merino is making his case again with his goal scoring exploits for his country. Viktor Gyokeres also enjoyed a very productive international break. Now these players need to stake their claims and support squad rotation. We may have our issues with some, maybe even all, these players to some extent. But Arsenal need them and last season was illustrative in terms of the impact of the squad. My doubts about Viktor Gyokeres, for example, remain. But I know he is certainly capable of better than we have seen from him this season. It also isn’t just a question of rotation. Brighton, for instance, were able to nullify some of Arsenal’s most typical threats reasonably well at the AMEX. There will be plenty of days when Arsenal need to change the paradigm from the bench and these players all have attributes to aid that pursuit. Can Saka become a more regular goal scorer? A couple of weeks ago I wrote a piece illustrating the fact that Bukayo Saka has been taking up far more shooting positions this season. Runs off the shoulder of the defender, central positions in the penalty area, more attentive runs on the back post, there has clearly been a concerted coaching effort to put him into shooting positions. That makes a lot of sense to me. The failure to recruit Morgan Rogers, Vinicius Junior or Julian Alvarez during the summer meant that Arteta was left to look internally at where he could crank more goals out of the attack. Saka seems like the best person to allocate that responsibility to. I have viewed some of the supporter conversation around Saka, at least online, with a sense of bafflement. I have seen lots of suggestions that he is well below his best and, while I have to be open to the idea that my assessment might be wrong, I just do not see that in any way, shape or form. My own theory is that hamstring and achilles issues have created a lot of (understandable) anxiety over his long-term potential. But I think that anxiety is causing people to actively look for issues that I do not think are there at the moment. I really liked this piece on the Non Negotiables Substack setting out how Saka’s game is evolving this season. The question is to what extent Mikel Arteta’s bet pays off on Saka becoming more of a talisman in front of goal. Acknowledging the small sample size, he is averaging 1.96 shots on target per 90 so far this season, which is a career high. The questions are whether he can maintain (maybe even increase) that average over a sustained period and, more importantly, whether it leads to him scoring more often. I think if he sustains his current shooting data (and stays fit!) we will see a career high for open play goals in a season. Bruno and Rice Bruno Guimaraes signed for Arsenal this summer to much fanfare. His signing probably says something about how Arteta sees Martin Zubimendi, as more of a high level squad option. Bruno’s arrival was meant to reshape the Gunners midfield, with Declan Rice moving more back towards the base of the midfield- which we have seen this season for certain. Bruno is a duel monster but he is also a very prolific passer through the lines. There is risk baked into his more progressive approach and, in truth, Brighton exposed some of the (hopefully temporary) fault lines as Bruno and Rice acclimatise to one another. Everyone has an appetite for greater risk until they start to remember what failed risk looks like. (Bruno came on as a sub at Sunderland and essentially won the game with a speculative long shot, risk also looks very nice when you roll a double six!) Bruno’s early season injury and Lewis Skelly’s excellent early season form have delayed the Rice and Bruno project. Hopefully, the respective fitness of both players allows us the chance to see that partnership fully foment during this block. Zubimendi, Merino and Lewis Skelly offer a lot of support and challenge in that area but how well Bruno and Rice gel feels pivotal for Arsenal’s season ambitions. The post Three questions for Arsenal in October and November appeared first on Arseblog ... an Arsenal blog.