Granit Xhaka will remain sidelined until after the next Interlull at least after he informed Unai Emery that he’s not ready to play yet.
The Swiss international was stripped of the captaincy this week after his outburst against the fans during the 2-2 draw with Crystal Palace on October 27th, but despite taking part in training it seems as if he’s not in the right frame of mind to make a contribution on the pitch.
Speaking ahead of Saturday’s crucial encounter with Leicester, the Arsenal boss confirmed the 27 year old would not make the trip to the King Power.
Asked if he’d be brought back into the fold, Emery said, “Not yet. I spoke with him.
“I spoke with him on Tuesday about how he’s feeling now and how he is in his mind.
“He’s working well, he’s training well, but he said to me that he’s not feeling good enough at the moment to play.
“We are going to wait.”
With Dani Ceballos ruled out with a hamstring strain, it leaves the Gunners a little light in central midfield, although Emery does have Lucas Torreira, Matteo Guendouzi and Joe Willock to call on, while Mesut Ozil’s return from footballing Siberia provides a bit more depth depending on the formation we play.
Whether Xhaka will feel ready after the Interlull remains to be seen, while speculation over his future at the club has begun with suggestions of a January move to Newcastle making headlines earlier today.
Apparently this moron said at his press conference that it’s a positive that we haven’t lost the last few games..
He’s a joke, isn’t he? Someone tell me the last 18 months have been a nightmare that I will wake up from soon, please.
Wait till you see Ozil partner Guendouzi in the midfield pivot and Torreira further ahead in the AM role, against Leicester.
Even better that Torriera will probably have the game of his life pulling the strings there and be subbed off at 65 minutes and we blow a 2 goal lead. Unbelievable this fucking clown is actually pre-tempting substitutions before a ball is kicked. Like mesut against liverpool? “We spoke about this before the game”.
The bloke has no fucking idea.
At least it has finally sunk in with Xhaka.
Most of us haven’t felt like he could play yet, and particularly as a captain.
I find it extraordinary that Ivan Gazidis, with a plethora of managers who were itching to take control of Arsenal, decided that a man with no track record of coaching solid defences, powerful attacks, or a pleasing style of football was the right man for this club. In literally every single important metric for a club like Arsenal, Emery did not match up. Yet we went along with him any way. PSG released him, he finished outside the top 4 positions in Spain every single year with Sevilla, conceding over 50 goals in the league every year. Sacked by Spartak… Read more »
apparently he makes great powerpoint presentations
He was free.
Wish I could say this to my employer.
“Sorry boss I’m not ready to do the job I’m paid millions for” … Yeah he deserves all our sympathy. The people get worked up over some pretty serious causes.
Off topic slightly br has anyone read through the press conf transcript.
Its so hard to understand what emery is getting at. No wonder we’re awful.
It’s lovely that he wants to speak English but clearly he’s very bad at it. Can’t they insist on him using a translator?
Rather than it being about his poor English, I’m convinced that 95% of what comes out of his mouth is just pure bullshit.
Yep. Probably that too.
There is ample evidence of this being the case scattered thought a season and a third’s worth of press conferences etc.
Yeah, I posted this on a different article. It’s just coach speak, but harder to decipher.
I read somewhere before that Xhaka was going to take a break from football after his daughter was born, don’t know if this and the other incident on the pitch are related but hopefully he is able to recover well and continue on whether it’s here with us or with another club elsewhere. I know it may be hard for some fans but maybe it’s time to forgive and move on, the man has after all apologised and I don’t think there is anything else he can do to fix the situation further, at least he is being professional in… Read more »
I still think the Xhaka Torreira partnership, although not perfect, was the one that produced the best results under Emery. I understand he wanted to make space for Guendouzi but there you go. Now Xhaka is out of the squad and Torreira would literally jump at a chance to get the hell out of the club. Sad times.
Mismanaged, no doubt.
I’m with Dan above, too — time to move on, and if Xhaka appears on the pitch in the red and white, the fans should cheer him on, as he’s an Arsenal player. Welcome him back, and turn the page. I’ve never understood the persistent vitriol for one of our own players.
He is currently doing the minimum as required by his contract. Must be nice to have that level of employment security.
If he wanted to take a break from football, he’s had plenty of opportunities to do so: over the summer, before accepting the captaincy, before reacting to the fans and certainly before releasing that statement.
I’m sure 130k a week is a huge incentive to remain professional.
I don’t really bother about what Emery has to say about this anymore. Frankly, on a human level, if Emery chooses to play Xhaka in the end, we should just get behind Xhaka. No point kicking a horse’s that’s carted but down.
On a purely human level, Xakha should take as long as he needs. On a football level, as an Arsenal fan, he should take even longer.
Sure let’s play Guendouzi as a DM and Torreira in a Ramsey role in the meantime 😉
Hard to know if this is true or if it’s more Emery doublespeak… I remember the Ozil stuff he said week in and week out to justify Mesut’s exclusions and tend not to trust what comes out of his mouth. If it’s true, I guess what Granit means it that it may be a bad idea to risk putting more fuel on the fire… but I really don’t know. He doesn’t strike me as a guy that asks not to play. More likely he accepted a decision which he felt was the only one available.
Everything Emery has said about Ozil sounds not like someone suffering from back pain or sickness, but from someone who needs mental health counseling. I hope Ozil is getting the help he needs (just so long as Erdogan isn’t involved- he should be in prison).
… and Emery can’t manage, but it doesn’t stop him trying
I can’t be the only one who doesn’t believe a word that comes out of this clown’s mouth. It was only a few weeks ago he came out about Ozil only to backtrack a week later!
Why can’t Emery just take responsibility for this situation himself rather than waiting for the player to ‘feel like’ playing again
*bangs head against wall*
Wow! Imagine telling you’re boss you can’t work Tuesday after you told your consumers to “F*ck Off”, just because they called you out for scrapping by for 4 years doing the bare minimum, performing terribly, achieving nothing and pocketing over £100k a week…. Putting the social media abuse of his family aside (as that’s a separate conversation entirely, if it is true). He deserved every bit of the “abuse” by the stadium fans he got, performed awfully for the past 4 years, single handily responsible for multi losses, red cards galore; then throwing the armband on the floor and walking… Read more »
Well said. Xhaka should either resign his contract if he is really upset, or make himself available for selection. The fact that he is nowhere near good enough to be selected is a side issue
Unreal. He’s on a contract that pays him 3x average UK annual income *every week.* And he’s declaring himself unwilling to play? I don’t want him to play, but that’s not his decision to make. Suspend him already.
He will leave here and never again start at such a big club. Typical Arsenal over the past decade.
You talk as if Emery said “please play on Saturday” and Xhaka answered “No way”. Pretty sure that’s not what happened. And by the way, do you still take everything Emery says at face value? Baffling.
Well we’ve all seen Emery’s inability to take a decision he’s responsible for. Perhaps Xhaka IS the best one to have the keys to the house on this call.
Beyond tired of hearing about what Xhaka feela or wants or doesn’t want. We have enough to think about. Foward!??
Move him in January if possible, and try to get some other midfielders in. Not the best approach, but we may have a new manager by then anyway.
Starting to agree with most here, a short term fix, if we can not find a long term manager, is better than staying with someone that can not fix the problems at hand. We may be seeing the worst of management now, be it football or commerce, where the manager creates problems, and then does not have the wherewithal to fix them.
Torreira as DM. Guendouzi as CM, Ozil as AM. With Pepe, Laca and Auba at the top. That is how it should be. Is it too impossible?
And maybe Bellerin and Tierney.
At this point it’s not even just about choice of players. I’m convinced that, even if Emery managed to stumble upon this formula that’s been obvious to practically everyone, he would still instruct Ozil to man mark their DM, Torreira to play as a roving second striker, and the team to funnel the ball away from the oppositions penalty box at all times. It’s like Emery is intentionally failing, with the type of wierd left-field nonsense he decides, when he can actually decide on anything. Has anyone checked he isn’t Sheringham in a mask??
What is this nonsense about being ready to play. I’m sorry but Xhaka has played the leader and fallen apart at the first bit of disruption. He’s a headstrong kid with no real backbone. Yes, everywhere they’ve made him Captain but we’re talking about Monchengladbach and the Swiss not Dortmund and Brazil. He’s not a leader. He and Emery deserve one another.
ALL ENTIRELY SELF INFLICTED…by Arsenal fans. We need every swinging dick available but some fans decided to agitate on the false premise that somehow Xhaka was less effective than other options. We have seen no discernable difference in control (if not worse) with out Granit. Torreira claim that he is used inappropriately by Unai but frankly when used in a deep role, he has also had shortcomings. He conspired to give the ball away many times in the deep role in which over 4 or 5 matches in around Xmas last season resulted in 4 or 5 goals against us.… Read more »
Am I being unfair calling Xhaxa a dramatic little fairy. We can all agree the treatment he got was unacceptable but his reaction both at the time and in the aftermath has made a much bigger mess of this than was necessary. He is showing what little character and mental strength he truly has. And this guy is who they made Captain. Indicative of the team right now.
As an Arsenal fan, I would be sad to see Xhaka leave the club. But as a human being, I would be happy for him to go elsewhere, because Arsenal’s atmosphere is being very toxic right now.
I totally agree that Unai Emery is not up to the job of managing the club and hopefully this will be realised soon and there be a parting of ways, however there is no need to be calling him a *moron* or a *fucking clown*, no need at all.
He is proving that he was never club captain material by sulking over his broused like this.
True leaders don’t have egos, or at least have them in check.
It’s a shame it wasn’t you bring booed by your own fans because unlike Xhaka you would have handled it perfectly.
Guys you should understand something! Aubameyang and Lacazette should not play same time. Either aubameyang or Lacazette should be on the bench. If you remember in Europe league with Chelsea our line was the same. Emery made again that mistake against Leicester city. I think he should get sacked. Uffff I am tired with this!!!! I hate the day I would arsenal fan.