Arsenal are in Champions League action this evening, away to Sparta Prague.
There was no sign of Viktor Gyokeres in the opening training session before the team left London, and in his press conference, the manager sounded quite downbeat about the injury the Swedish striker sustained in the 2-0 win over Burnley on Saturday, saying:
He’s definitely not available. He hasn’t trained today, and we need to do some more tests and scans in the next few days to understand the extent of the injury, but for this game he’s not available.
I am concerned because he hasn’t had many muscular issues and he had to leave the pitch as he was feeling something, and that’s obviously never a good sign. Especially for a player that is very, very explosive, so we are digging in a little bit more to understand where we are in terms of injury and we will announce it when we know more.
You never fully know when it comes to Arteta and injuries, but it doesn’t sound as if it’s just a minor thing. With most of the other forward options sidelined too, it gives him some thinking to do about his team this evening. He could use Mikel Merino, as he did on Saturday; there’s the option to play Leandro Trossard there; or even hand a start to young Andre Harriman-Anous who played in the EFL Cup win over Brighton.
Tonight’s opposition sit top of their domestic league, unbeaten at home in all competitions since December last year, when Anderlecht went there and won 2-1. Even so, I think we’ll see a team that has changes. There’s no Martin Zubimendi, who is suspended, so we could see Christian Norgaard start, and it wouldn’t surprise me if players like Ben White, Myles Lewis-Skelly, Ethan Nwaneri, Piero Hincapie and Cristhian Mosquera were involved. If Arteta is rightly worried about the lack of options up front, he does have the capability of rotating further back – not just to give those players minutes, but to protect his ‘first choice’ starters ahead of a difficult away game in the Premier League this weekend.
Up top, I’m sure we’ll see Bukayo Saka start. Eberechi Eze could play on the left if he wants to play Trossard up front, but without Gyokeres, Gabriel Martinelli, Kai Havertz, Noni Madueke, Gabriel Jesus and Martin Odegaard, the options really are severely limited. Arteta says:
We have to face it [the injury situation], we’ve been facing it in a brilliant way and we’ll continue like this. Tomorrow, we know we’re going to face a really good challenge here and, in the team as well, they are very intense, very direct, very vertical and we’re going to have to be really good to achieve what we want.
Arsenal have been perfect so far in Europe this season. Three games, three wins, no goals conceded, and I’m sure that’s a record the manager is keen to uphold. I just wonder if, with the injuries, potential rotation, and the game coming so soon after the last one, if this game might be a bit more helter-skelter than we normally see. Let’s see what happens, and don’t forget this is an early kick-off too, with the game at 17.45.
Meanwhile, the date for the Carabao Cup quarter-final against Crystal Palace has been announced, and it’s December 23rd at 8pm. That means we play just two days after our trip to Everton on December 21st, and it looks as if Arsenal have made a request to have that game moved back to the Saturday. Speaking about it last night, Mikel Arteta said:
Hopefully they will move our Premier League match because to play two days later, it doesn’t make any sense obviously. We will now decide the date, I’m sure they will change the Premier League date as well. I think we’re very clear what’s the best thing, the most logical date to play. I’m sure we’ll have to adapt to that.
The issue is that this game has been moved to that Sunday for TV coverage (Sky), and Arsenal fans will have already booked travel and possibly accommodation on the basis of that. The other aspect is that Palace themselves play on December 18th in the Europa League, which means their Premier League game away to Leeds is also on December 21st, with no real chance of moving that back. So, in the interests of ‘fairness’, they might say that while two days between games is not ideal, it’s the same for both sides.
The other side of that is that Arsenal have, to some extent, been flexible to ensure Palace haven’t had to play four games in eight days, but even so I just can’t see them changing the date of the Everton game. A decision on that would have to be made pretty soon, so I’d expect to hear something this week. Whatever happens though, it’s not ideal for either club, and as I said the other day, the fixture congestion is a consequence of decisions made by those who run the game without sufficient thought for the players or the fans.
Let’s see what happens, but one way or the other, a cup quarter-final is going to be diminished because of the schedule, and ultimately that’s a shame.
Right, I’ll leave it there now. We’re hoping to have the live blog back later on, but we’ll announce on BlueSky if we’re running that coverage. We will have all the usual stuff on Arseblog News, and there’s an Arsecast Extra below if you haven’t had a chance to listen yet.
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