How Arsenal can end inconsistency and beat Newcastle with three undroppables for Mikel Arteta

Ten Premier League games into the 2023/24 campaign and Mikel Arteta's Arsenal look on track to repeat their title challenge from last year. With their unbeaten start stretched to ten, the highest goal difference in the league, it's all looking up for the Gunners.

It shouldn't and won't be surprising to many — the team that led the league for so much of last season is up there again, challenging for the title and are determined to do one better this time. Determined to win their first league title for 20 years.

But that's not really looked like the case over the past month. Inconsistency and fatigue have started to creep into the side — mistakes are happening which we weren't seeing at this stage of last season. They've created just the seventh-most xG, the tenth-most if you take away penalties and sit fifth in the Expected Points table.

The mixing-and-matching that has come with the injuries the side has suffered, as well as the consistent experimentation with swapping Aaron Ramsdale and David Raya in-and-out of the No.1 shirt, appears to have Arteta scrambling to find his best XI. Over their last three matches, just Ben White and Gabriel have started all three.

The likes of Thomas Partey and Gabriel Jesus suddenly becoming unavailable over long periods of this early part of the season has no doubt become a serious problem for the squad, who don't have the depth to deal with the amount of injuries they've had. Then again, not many squads do in the Premier League. But despite all that, the side are still capable of winning games.

It's a sign of a serious title contender — the ability to win when you're not at 100% and grinding three points out against teams below you in the table. Unfortunately, Newcastle might be below