\n<\/p>\n
It has been a mixed season for Martinelli – who was heavily criticised for an altercation with injured Liverpool defender Conor Bradley during the week. <\/p>\n
But the winger will hope his first hat-trick for the Gunners will be the boost he needs, as Arsenal attempt to win major silverware for the first time since their 2020 FA Cup success.<\/p>\n
Martinelli has lost his place as a regular starter in the Premier League but has excelled in the Champions League, scoring five goals in his five appearances in the competition.<\/p>\n
The fight for places has gone up a notch this season, with more depth in the squad after eight summer signings – including forwards Madueke, Eberechi Eze and Viktor Gyokeres.<\/p>\n
That depth allowed Arteta to make 10 changes and still name a team featuring Spain international Mikel Merino, plus England internationals Madueke and Eze.<\/p>\n
Key centre back Gabriel Magalhaes was the only player to keep his place from the draw against Liverpool on Thursday.<\/p>\n
Merino, captain for the day, was one of Arsenal’s best performers at Fratton Park. Again asked to play in an unfamiliar deep-lying midfield role, the 29-year-old used his experience to do an important job.<\/p>\n
Alongside the positives of the win, the hat-trick for Martinelli and minutes for squad players, Arteta was able to welcome back Kai Havertz as the forward featured for the first time since picking up a knee injury on the opening day of the season.<\/p>\n
This was the first of four away games in four different competitions for the Gunners – and it is a sign of how successful their season has been so far that they still have so much to play for.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
It has been a mixed season for Martinelli – who was heavily criticised for an altercation with injured Liverpool defender Conor Bradley during the week. But the winger will hope his first hat-trick for the Gunners will be the boost he needs, as Arsenal attempt to win major silverware for the first time since their<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5668,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5667","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-football"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5667","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5667"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5667\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5668"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5667"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5667"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5667"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}