Friday Premier League Preview and Odds – Arsenal vs Leicester City

August 11, 2017 19:45pm

Emirates Stadium, London

Recent form (All competitions)

Arsenal: WLWLW

Leicester City: WLLDW

The 2017 Premier League campaign finally gets underway on Friday night as last year’s FA Cup winners take on 2015/16 league champions Leicester City at the Emirates Stadium.

The new Friday night scheduling might not to be everyone’s liking but it does its job of acting as a curtain raiser to the weekend’s action.

Arsenal have already been in competitive action, having beaten title holders Chelsea in last weekend’s Community Shield event. They needed penalties to secure a win over the team who they also defeated in last season’s FA Cup Final. That pair of wins should give them plenty of confidence heading into the new campaign.

New signing Alexandre Lacazette is expected to start and will be hoping to replicate the form he showed at the beginning of last year’s Ligue 1 campaign when he bagged a hat-trick on the opening day. Also set to start is fellow newcomer Sead Kolasinac, who netted the equaliser on Sunday.

Meanwhile, after a string of uninspiring pre-season performances, Leicester finally seemed to have got their act together last week when they edged to a 2-1 win over Borussia Monchengladbach. That result followed a run of three defeats, two draws and a single win in their previous pre-season matches.

After finishing 12th last year, the Foxes will be hoping for a better campaign this time round. They have added defender Harry Maguire, midfielder Vicente Iborra and striker Kelechi Iheanacho to their ranks and have decided to retain the services of Coach Craig Shakespeare.

However, the East Midlands side have not beaten Arsenal in over 20 years and have lost on their last 10 visits to North London. Last season, they failed to find the net against the Gunners and during their title-winning season, two of their three defeats came against Wenger’s men.

Prediction

Leicester’s awful record against Arsenal looks set to continue on Friday night. The home win looks like the most likely outcome here and actually looks decent value at prices of around 1/2.

Back Arsenal to win 40/85 with Betfair.