Tomas Rosicky and Per Mertesacker are doubts for Arsenal’s match with Swansea on Sunday having not recovered from whatever minor medical ailments kept them out of Monday’s Thierry-tastic win over Leeds. (You wanted specifics? Pfff…)
The duo have not yet been ruled out, but will be given a final assessment tomorrow before Arsene Wenger’s squad fly to Wales.
The boss also gave a positive update on some of the long-term absentees. In addition to confirming that Kieran Gibbs would return at the end of January, he stated:
“Hopefully the players will come back very quickly now. With Carl Jenkinson we had very good news on his scan and he is starting to practice again, we have Thomas Vermaelen who is the first to come back, Bacary Sagna is evolving well and Santos is doing well too. Let’s hope they all come back quickly.
“I always said February for Wilshere. If he makes that then I am happy.”
Still short on options at the back, it appears that the club are still keeping their collective eyes peeled during the transfer window.
Speaking about the options open to him, Wenger told Arsenal Player: “All over the world we have our eyes and we look for good [players].
“It is very simple in a situation like that. You might take a player who doesn’t play at all somewhere, who is not necessarily fit quicker than a player who is injured. Or you take a young, potential player who has not made it somewhere.
“A player who plays anywhere in the world at the moment will not be available on loan, it doesn’t exist. It can only be a guy who doesn’t play or a promising player who has not yet made it completely who you could take advantage of.”
One such candidate appears to be Omani international Saad Al-Mukhaini. The 24-year-old is set to undertake a trial with the Gunners having been welcomed to England by Wigan keeper (and compatriot) Ali Al Habsi on Twitter.
Finally some news on Jenkinson.
Thanks for introducing a little riaotnailty into this debate.
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LLONS like lots of new signings
Bac is “evolving” as well, I hope into a higher being with laser beam eyes so he can shoot death beams at opposing full backs before cutting the ball back for TH12 to stick it past the blinded keeper. That would be good.
loan LLONS!!
Is Diaby still alive?
he’s evolved into a human treatment table hybrid. leather skin, adjustable arms, very comfy but prone to breaking down less than 5 minutes after being used
Who is this Diaby you speak of?
Barely alive. Gentlemen, we can rebuild him. We have the technology. We have the capability to make the world’s first footballer assembled from plates and small screws. Abou Diaby will *be* that footballer.
Don’t know if wenger wants to spend 6 million dollars on that tbh.
@Rayparlourinho
haha, i want to double thumbs up that!
You mean when he’s back in the team all of his runs and jumps will be in slow motion with a stupid synthesiser tune playing?
The upside is that his hearing will be so good that he can hear everything the opposing coach says to his players at half time.
FINALLY good news on jenkinson. I was actually worried that his injury might turn into a rosicky-like nightmare.
Also, the criticism “fans” on “the blog that shall not be named” have piled upon the oman defender, simply for being from oman, is staggering and quite frankly pathetic. You haven’t even seen him play!!
I’ve been to Oman.it’s very very hot.if he can survive that then he can handle any thing the premiership has to offer. Unless it snows ofc.. That might freak him out a bit.
To be fair I don’t think they were having a go because he is from Oman. I think it’s just the usual reaction to Wenger’s interest in guys they have never heard of before.
As for diaby, apparently he’s in qatar receiving treatment. He might not make the squad i guess, if this continues.
Saad Al-Mukhaini is 24, and Al-Habsi was the Wigan keeper last time I checked.
Cheers – made the change. LAZY ‘journalism’ (Bows head in shame)
It good to hear bacary is evolving well, hopefully an unbreakable bone.
Would prefer him to evolve spontaneous mirror-clone reproduction. Bacary Sagna to play Right Back and Angas Yracab to play Left Back.
Hopefully we get near full strenght team back for manc game and give them a fucking hiding
I hear we are going to high jack the Gary Cahill to Chelsea move.
Haha,you just banned yourself frog for three days, there’s the banter gone
Hmmm, I was just thinking that.
He did it on purpose.
I’m like sepptic bladder of FIFA fame, the rules don’t apply to me! Hahaha
@Frog – ha.
With all these sicknotes coming back ‘a la’ LANS Stan’ll be ‘throwing money in the air like he just doesn’t care…’
…and Harry Redknapp will be round to catch it and stuff it into a mattress.
The two players whom we have badly missed in the last couple of months have been Sagna and Wilshire. The sooner that we can get those two fit and playing regularly the better. Jenkinson is no big miss. He is on the learning curve and needs games (on loan maybe) to develop into a player who might be able to hold down a place at the club. We have also missed Santos’ attacking on the left. We really need the quality players back asap. As I sad yesterday, our squad is just awful, and we just can’t cope with the… Read more »
our squad is not awful and Wilshire is WILSHERE
Chamakh.
Park.
Almunia.
Fabianki.
Rosicky.
Jenkinson.
Diaby.
Squilaci
Are any of these players really Arsenal quality?
But park bangs in the goals for his national team!!!!! He must be great. Haha and I might even add djourou to that list.
yes they DO have the quality to be squad players for Arsenal.
we can’t have BENZEMA as back up striker
the INVINCIBLE SQUAD was made up of players like Pires ,Thierry Henry and and and…
Jérémie Aliadière
David Bentley
18 y.o Gaël Clichy
Justin Hoyte
Philippe Senderos
Francis Jeffers
and PASCAL CYGAN
my point is you can’t make a a full team full of super QUALITY players .
NOW STFU and support the team ,you can buy Neymar in your FIFA12
What does STFU mean?
oh sorry
STFU = Shut The Fuck Up
O dear me, that’s not a very nice thing to tell somebody.
Sorry but Fatgooner and Frog are correct. Our back up players are dire. Check the list. Either appalling records this season or no records at all.
I disagree with you on Leeroy, I thought he was looking brilliant just before the back went. Fantastic final ball, he’ll learn much better as a sub under Sagna then elsewhere.
I think we’ve missed Santos and Sagna, I don’t think its coincidence that Gervinho and Walcott’s form dipped as our first choice left/right back went mia.
I’m really looking forward to seeing Wilshere, Arteta and Song in the middle.
AW says Gibbs will be back by the end of January. 2012?
Very quickly? Oh, thank GAWD! Because when Arsenal say “2-3 weeks” what usually happens is that the player comes back in 2-3 weeks! Right? Right?
The longer we go without full-backs, the longer our attack has no support from the wings, and the more one-dimensional our forward play becomes.
Fatgooner – just seen your list and I’ve got to say that I think you are out of your mind. Rosicky has been quality this year and save injuries is valuable to the squad. He might not be a starter any more but hey. Chamakh, play him in the right position and save his fragile confidence and you have a player who scores goals. Was solid at Bordeaux but Wenger plays him as a sole striker which is just not him. Park – can’t comment. None of us can with adding conjecture. I think though as he’s not given any… Read more »
Sorry but I think YOU are on LSD Northerngooner.
Almunia : shite.
Fabianski : shite (the fact you call him ‘Flappy’ proves my point.
Chamakh: shite. Will NEVER get to play in a ‘Fair’ position whilst the 1st team are strong, so he will never play to the best of his abilities (Like Arshavin). He just won’t cut the mustard.
Squilliaci: Shite.
Rosicky: Only good as a ‘back-up’ player. NOT shite but not that great either.
Sounds like the manager is not totally confident that Wilshire will be back by Feb. Or am I reading too much into the quote?
The point that I am trying to make is that our first team isn’t that great, and when you look to the bench there isn’t too much quality there either. For example: our biggest problem right now is up front. Gervinho and Walcott are two average players. When we are desperate for a goal who can we call on? Ok, Henry for the next six games. But then who? There are four types of players at Arsenal right now: 1. The diamonds – RvP, Vermaelen, Sagna 2. The good young prospects who are not there yet but may become great:… Read more »
we were also lucky not to have long term injuries , imagine if we had 7 fullbacks ,Sol campbell and Vieira injured ,Any team would suffer ,even if you have 2 brilliant starting eleven . we are going through a hard time right now ,and most people think the solution is Buy buy buy and the current players are crap . we are struggling to have the form we had when we had our specialized full backs and you are moaning about Fabianski , did he injure them ?. Sure we need another goal scorer ,but that’s the only problem… Read more »
thats is stupid @fatgooner where is arteta and song!!!!we have a very commited squad now but it needs some kind of injection!!!i hope wenger buys one quality player and finish the contract issue with rest of them and then we have all our injured players back. we are set. but the only thing i am worried about is DIABY in the hell is he tryin to do with diaby.this is ARSENAL.this is no place for trial and error.if he is not able to make the cut loan him and see if he can stay injury free or atleast free up… Read more »
You can’t send Diaby out on loan until he is fit.
If Diaby is fit he is a very good player and we would be stupid to send him out on loan. We would take him ourselves.
Anyway, Diaby is a player who, while playing for us, kicked John Terry unconscious (who cares if they won the trophy, we had more to smile about than them that day). You show loyalty and patience to a player like that. 🙂
If you want bloody perfection you are going to have to look at a different sport. Maybe something with only one person on each side. Snooker, perhaps. You are not going to get your wish no matter how hard you wish it. Look at Man City. They have significantly less injuries / long term injuries than we do but the few they have had are starting to mess with their season. They have spent hundreds of millions of pounds to get a perfect full squad and even they couldn’t get one. We’ve got what we’ve got until the summer. There… Read more »
No new striker/attacking midfielder = No top-four finish.
It’s as simple as that.
but we have a very good striker and very good attacking midfielder .
Put that way I agree with you wholeheartedly. Maybe not on each of the individuals but generally speaking you’re right. Compare it to Citeh for example and their bench is frightening I’d go as far as saying Utdshit are the same. We can bring on Park or Chamakh, they can bring on Berbatov and Owen.
I think we’ll get a massive lift from Jack coming back but it doesn’t solve the goal scoring problem.
Exactly. Neither Jack or Arteta or Ramsey score goals consistently, either.
I know we’ve got Henry, but I would really like to see the striker bought NOW!
We are averaging just one goal per game over our last ten matches. Our defending is fine, but we need a striker or attacking midfielder who can do the business up til the end of the season.
And I don’t want Wenger to wait until midnight on the 31st – that’s wasting time.
You know damn well that if by some miracle, we do get a striker this January, arsene will leave it to the last minute to save a few quid.
As much as you and I know what needs to be done, it ain’t gonna happen. What a fucking shame. What’s happening to the club I love? We used to be ruthless.
How many injuries did it take to their squad before they started losing 75% of their games? Vast reserves of unearned money and free spending on virtually any player you want still cannot guarantee a winning squad
Oh and we really need an edit button. My typos are ridiculous tonight.
How koscielny is ranked as a ‘good pro’ is beyond me. He’s our outstanding defender. I’m glad I don’t see life through your shit tinted glasses.
Kos has been an ‘outstanding defender’ this season but has to continue this form to be considered as such. Song is in the same boat for me. If he carries on as he has been then by the end of season move him into ‘diamond’ category for mine. (along with scez). IMO @fatgooner your list is too harsh an assessment. Agree with northergooner – our wide midfielders are really missing actual f/backs behind them. It’s ok to want us to be better but sometimes I really wonder about your support fatgooner ( and your BFF frog). This squad that you… Read more »
Fat gooner, Jenkinson should not be in that list, no way, nada, not even close. He is gonna be an excellent player for us.
How can you say that? He’s been at the club for all of ten minutes!
Paul, 1steved1 – read the post after the list from fatgooner and it’s explained a lot better. I’m inclined to agree with both him and Frog; we do need a striker and I can’t see Wenger signing anyone now. If we do it’ll be a loan signing for left back which is frankly pointless. It’s a major concern, as our squad is threadbare as it is. IF, and it’s a big IF, we have summer signings lined up already (waiting for “super quality”) then at least we know that we’re showing we’re committed to decent signings and VP, Walcott and… Read more »
I never really mentioned transfers or my expectations there just that I feel that as an arsenal supporter you can still want us to improve without being so negative towards the current squad. It seems they might be overlooking some quality for the sake of their argument. Just my thoughts .
On the transfer side I’m going to join the team there and hope for a decent striker/attacking signing as i also feel thats what we need most. I don’t think it will happen though and nor do I think he’ll sign a left back. Love to be surprised.
Thanks for all the responses to my posts on this page. I would just like to make it clear that I know full well that we won’t get the striker that we so desperately need in this transfer window. By now, we all know exactly how Arsene Wenger thinks and works. Just as he sat back and did nothing when we absolutely had to sign a centre-half last January, and when he did nothing last summer until the Old Trafford humiliation stung him into panic-buying, Wenger will stubbornly fail to address the glaring problem that we have in scoring goals.… Read more »
well said fat. thats pretty much the arsenal in a nutshell as of late. i see a 6th place finish. hope im wrong.
I’m still not convinced its Wenger who’s pulling the strings when it comes to transfers and as I’ve said on multiple occasions I’m more inclined to think its the board. I’m not saying he’s entirely blameless though, he’s infamous for his poor management of contract renewals. To echo Blogs how the likes of Bendtner and Denilson are on big fat wages is beyond me. We can’t move players on because of their over-inflated ego’s and matching salaries. The sooner their time’s up with us the better. Oh and it irks me every time I see those scum above us in… Read more »
It least they dropped two points today. Let’s hope it’s the start of the rot.
I’m not altogether convinced its wengers fault either, have a feeling his hands are tied at times by the board, but then he plays chamakh on his last day before going to Africa instead of giving park a chance and he persists with the lazy arshavin who showed against Leeds he can work but just chooses not to in most games. Who knows who’s to blame but it can’t carry on. Something has to give before we get the fans into the state they where at the beginning of the season. Arsene doesn’t deserve his legacy to be one of… Read more »
Too right. For me, to end on a positive note, signing Arteta was a master stroke. Oxtail Chamberpot, same. Benayoun quality though I wish he could have more game time. Some great moves so let’s follow it on when the summer transfer window opens rather than just before it closes. Take care all
I think the point is that we need players, or at least a single player, that consistently can come off the bench and be a threat when we need a goal… Minus Henry, we don’t have that and it cost us points
I think is quite time 4 wenger to sign a formidable striker and a left flank player b/4 d january window exit, at least to boast d team, and as wel encourage some pivotal players to sign new contract e.g(R.V.P)