Mikel Arteta has confirmed that four first-team stars will miss Arsenal’s clash with Club Brugge in the Champions League on Wednesday night.
The Gunners are the only side in the competition with a 100% record so far this season, winning all five of their games, including against the likes of Atletico Madrid and Bayern Munich.
But the north London club are looking to bounce back from defeat in the Premier League against Aston Villa at the weekend, but Arteta has now confirmed that they will be forced to do so without four first-team players in Belgium, after they didn’t travel with the rest of the squad.
Four Arsenal Stars Ruled Out vs Club Brugge
Arsenal have been forced to deal with several injury issues throughout the season so far in this campaign, and now more players have been struck down.
Influential midfielder Declan Rice, star defender William Saliba, forward Leandro Trossard and superstar teenage sensation Max Dowman are all now unavailable for the trip to Brugge, and will join the likes of Kai Havertz, Gabriel Magalhaes and Cristhian Mosquera on the sidelines.
“Yes, so first of all, unfortunately, Max [Dowman] picked up an injury last weekend and had to come off,” Arteta revealed.
“So he did some scans, and he is going to be out for weeks, and then we have the situation of Gabi [Jesus], who we were expecting to be training with us by the end of December.
“No, so Declan [Rice] was ill. He was quite sick after the game, and he hasn’t travelled with us. William [Saliba] is still not available, and Leo [Trossard] again picked up another knock in an area where he had the issue, and I don’t expect that it’s going to be long, but unfortunately, he cannot be here.”
Gyokeres and Calafiori Minutes Being Managed
In addition to those players being absent, Arteta has revealed that he is having to manage the minutes of other players as Arsenal aren’t getting a lot of time to train, including Viktor Gyokeres and Riccardo Calafiori.
“I mean, losing Max again, it’s obviously not ideal with Leo, who is just coming back, that we have to manage the minutes,” he shared. “Willy is still not there. We’ve not got Big Gabi, and we have other players that who could only play certain minutes. Like, for example, Riccy [Calafiori] the other day. But it’s a situation that we have managed since the beginning of the season.
“Yeah, we have to continue to manage his [Gyokeres] minutes. He played 45 minutes the other day. Let’s see how it goes tomorrow.”
Calafiori could be rested with the Italian suspended for the weekend clash with Wolves anyway, while Gyokeres could feature for a bit longer to build fitness as Merino could be moved back into midfield.