I'm more worried about the age and inexperience of the squad than the size. The latter does leave us vulnerable to injury and fatigue but with the number of games and young legs I think that's manageable.
They might miss out on top 4 because of inexperience, that does cost you points. But as long as I see progress from last year, which seems evident at the moment, then I can live with them missing out.
Arteta seems to be building something, if clearing out dead wood was the first step of that and he's going to build on that then we'll be heading in the right direction.