Mikel Arteta provided an injury update on Bukayo Saka who had to be substituted in the closing stages of today’s 0-0 draw with Leeds United.
The 19-year-old was a bright spark when he came on for Joe Willock in the aftermath of Nicolas Pepe’s red card but didn’t finish the game after picking up a knock in a late clash with Kalvin Phillips.
It remains to be seen whether he recovers in time for Thursday’s Europa League game with Molde on Thursday.
“He was in pain,” said the manager. “We’re going to have to assess with the medical staff how bad it is, but it looked like a pretty bad challenge and he was in pain so we decided to take him out straight away.”
With Pepe facing a three-game ban in the league, Mo Elneny and Sead Kolasinac sidelined by positive Covid-19 diagnoses and a thigh problem keeping Thomas Partey out, Arteta’s squad is being stretched at a time when games come thick and fast in the run-up to Christmas.
To add to the problems, Willian, who this week earned a ticking off for flying to Dubai during the Interlull, also complained of a problem.
The Brazil international started on the left of attack but was nearly anonymous before being replaced at half time by Reiss Nelson. It turned out not to be a tactical decision.
“He was feeling something muscular and we had to take him off,” Arteta confirmed.
What difference does it make, we play 11 defenders anyway.
We actually have that many as well. Only problem is getting them into the PL/EL list.
Can Sokratis pass for an 18 Yr old to be added to the B-list 😉
I dunno.
To me his face resembles that of a grown man’s father.
Either we play with 0 defenders or, like now, 11 defenders. Its time to find some kind of balance.
It seems like we are balancing for the 2nd half or the Wenger era 😅🤣
*of
So if Willian had been fit Arteta would have left him on? smh
Get well soon Bukayo!
Maybe he could have taken Pepe off instead (before he got sent off).
no kidding! I’m not his biggest fan, but having Ozil in the team and not signing Willian at all probably would have been better business.
And to think, i thought Willian was subbed cos he’s shit.
Probably why im not a football manager 🤔
I think we all thought that was the reason he was subbed. I suppose if he was “feeling something” it could explain his performance – but only for this game!
It’s the muscle. He had too much muscle sprinkled with salt by that *&$^$% in Dubai
I think I saw him bent over supporting himself with his hands on his knees severally, and it looked really awkward considering it was the first half. Then there was that through ball from Pepe that he seemed too leggy to get to.
The ironic thing is that by inexplicably not rotating Willian regularly even with his poor form, Arteta has overextended the player.
One way or another Arteta will be forced to rotate.
I hope Bukayo is OK, that is all.
We definitely need Partey back as soon as possible. I really don’t care if Willian is unavailable for a while. In fact, he and Pepe can train with the Özil squad for a month as far as I am concerned.
I was happy Willian was taken off. Didn’t deserve to start as it is. You got to question Arteta “non-negotiables’ application regarding continued selection of Willian. Unfortunately Pepe ruined his chances to be a serious replacement.
Good to see we’re turning Willian into a scapegoat.
This arsenal fan base love to vilify a player.
Who in the arsenal attack has performed well this season? Why isn’t Auba getting the same treatment? He’s been equally ineffective.
I’m not saying I’m delighted with Willian. But there is a massive flaw with the system and it is not right to judge any player until that is sorted.
I’m so pleased there are no fans in the stadium. The noisy minority would make it toxic right now.
How effective will be Auba when he could not get a ball in the final third??? I know there is a system issue but when you see Willian playing, he almost feel to me that he lacks motivation to play. He seems to not interested at all, and this is not the first time.
its funny how when it comes to Ozil the same system excuse is not used. He is not a scapegoat he not that good hardly improved us at all. He is no better than the players we had before.
Auba’s been shite all season
And then there’s A Taylor…….. what a clown for 8 years now.
Utd got a pen yesterday for less of a handball than the Leeds one.
Tackle on Gabriel at 82…. how is that not a foul?
The offsides…… linesman never raised his flag once and var if needed ( and I accept it wasn’t) wud have denied a goal in all three occasions that Leeds nearly scored…….. all offside.
Pepe was stupid…… it’s arsenal….. he goes.
Leeds fouled the fuck out of us…… how many yellows? Not many.
Aren’t the linesmen being told not to raise their flags, seems pointless complaining about those incidents ? Cos to be fair I think that is working. Better to disallow a goal that was actually offside than to stop a chance & then find out after it was onside? See our 2 goals v West Ham- both tight but correctly allowed but pre-VAR I think may have been flagged
To be clear I hate VAR overall but the not flagging bit is working
Sensible reply DPK…… didn’t know that!
Thanks
Oh my God…..someone responded to a.comment that didn’t totally agree with them in a reasonable manner. Hats off sir, welcome to the internet. Reasonable isn’t the norm here 😂
Jet lag catching up with Willian……
It’s really starting to feel like endgame for Arteta. Unless there’s a total turnaround in fortunes soon (which is not impossible) it looks like his short (not all bad) stint as manager will come to an end. I am saddened by this as he really looked and sounded the part for a period of time and looked to be solving some of our problems. In fairness I thought Emery was ok at the start too.. The club seems to be rotten from the top down, the Willian signing for me was the straw that broke the camels back. It’s hard… Read more »
No
Great. Who do we replace him with? Fat Sam is available, isn’t he? Gary Monk has been fired again, right? Maybe wait for Solskier to get the sack? Or maybe, just maybe, we give the rookie manager at least one full year in a pandemic-ravaged league? Just sayin’. I wonder if Arteta was as keen on signing Willian as has been presented. The way things were run under Raul, he was probably just given a list of over-30 Kia clients and he figured Willian was the least bad one. Remember, Raul was fired shortly after Willian was signed, and part… Read more »
If Willian is not Arteta’s player, then why does Arteta persist in playing him?
Perhaps the real problem is with Edu who has demonstrated a clear liking for players of his nationality.
He’s just decided not to register Ozil. That’s 350 000 a week down the drain for the rest of the year. Now he’s not gonna play a brand new player who’s on 250 000 pounds for the next three years? Even if he hated him more than Blogs hates Phil Collins, he’d need to be seen as giving him every oportunity to succeed – at least at the beginning. I don’t buy the nationality angle. Both Willian and Luiz were estanblished Premier League players, and Luiz was likely not even an Edu signing. That leaves Martinelli (amazing signing), Gabriel (has… Read more »
Kias house? That would be either one of his courtesy bungalows at London Colney or the Emirates, right?
I think so of the fan-base is getting carried away with the Cup & Shield triumph. It certainly didn’t seem to matter (less than a handful) years ago. Don’t get me wrong, it was very satisfying to watch us beat those teams along the way. But the most important aspect is that we got into EL through the FA Cup victory. Mind you, our revenue and new signings will be affected if we (GOD FORBID) miss out on European competitions entirely. Before some of you tie Arteta’s contract to Willian’s, let’s see how much improvement can Arteta bring about before… Read more »
*some of the fan-base…
Absolute toxic garbage. Arteta has been with us less than a year and has already won a trophy. He had a difficult job after the Emery debacle and he has tightened our defence. He has made 2 great signings with Gabriel and Partey and still needs more time. Arsenal have never had a reputation for knee jerk reactions when it comes to managers if you look at our history. We have only played 9 games and therefore it is totally ludicrous to write him off.
This is hand sanitizer, and we all need to use it.
(Thanks, Martin!)
Your right of course…But in the midst of Covid and more so the fact that the spuds are top our ‘peers’ seem to have all settled and some are looking better than before. While we sit literally mid table next to teams i can honestly say i dont know if we can beat them The Leeds game today i didnt watch fearing we would get walloped. I was actually initially relieved when i saw 0 -0 (then i saw the performance) .That’s how far we have fallen and that’s why everyone is rightfully in my opinion panicking and knee jerking.
Knee jerking and panicking is never right. It’s only 9 matches for heaven’s sake and and even Liverpool and ManCity haven’t shown any great consistency and to talk about replacing Arteta is a joke.
Let’s not kid ouselves. While Arteta might yet turn out to be a good coach someday, he isn’t ready right now for a job this big. This shit show isn’t gonna get better. Just a matter of time before he goes though i don’t see that happening before the january transfer window in which we will definately sign a stop gap creative midfielder to paper over the cracks. But it’s pretty obvious we aren’t going anywhere near the champions league with Arteta. Wonder how long it’s gonna take the Kroenke’s to realise that.
I don’t even know anymore with this squad. If we don’t sign a CAM in Jan, we are so screwed. I’m not asking for a 50m pound singing. Just asking for some young fresh blood, a young CAM or CM or two willing to run around energetically providing exciting one twos.
God, we are so dull.
What is arteta going to do with a CAM? If he wants to keep playing this way then it’s an irrelevance. I’d always like to see more quality attacking and creative players but from what I’ve seen he wouldn’t get anything out of them, just instruct them on their roles within the rigid structure. At this point I don’t think it’s personel. We need more if we want to push for the top but there’s probably 10 teams right now who (if managed well) could break into that top 4 and we should be one of them
We have enough quality in this team to get back up into the top four, but Arteta is struggling to find the balance. We’ve been so focused on width and wide play for 2 years now, that we’ve lost the innate ability to burst the lines up the middle and carve a team open. We no longer have the technical midfield players (one touch, quick turns, burst of past, bullseye passing) we once did, but it’s clear that Arteta is going to have give his midfielders, all of them, the licence to go forward and drive the attack. Molde, Rapid,… Read more »
Emery, Ljungberg and Arteta realized our biggest weakness is midfield. We have shit Centre mids in comparison to not only our top 6 rivals but sides like Crystal Palace. Newcastle. I just watched fucking Brighton use OUR tactics better than us and smash and grab Villa….with Fucking Welbeck and Muapay up top. Lesser teams are getting more out of worse players or they simply have better players in lesser teams… Partey aside I have no words for Xhaxa. Ceballos ‘our ball player’ is average. Cazorla he is not. Elneny will always be Elneny despite his improved performances. Willock has energy… Read more »
Our process doesn’t require a CAM. We had one, but MA deemed it superfluous to his process.
And even if we had one, how many chances do you think striking spendthrifts like Laca are going to convert? He makes a CAM looks bad in terms of assists.
I only wonder when we are going to exit this phase of the ‘process’.
Overrated Auba. Flat track bully.
#Artetaout
Even during the Emery era, we knew we had an over reliance on Auba scoring and if the goals ever dried up, we’d be in deep shit.
Well, guess who’s knee deep in shit’s creek now without a paddle…
So finally Reiss will get a run of games 👍🏽
So, was starting Willian a part of the punishment/ticking-off? Unlike some of the other Arsenal players (midfielders, mostly), he can do no wrong, apparently. Having read some of the other responses on Willian, I seem to remember Arteta being quoted in reports as confirming he gave the green light on the recent signings. Any argument about that not being the complete truth would also take credit away from the signings that have looked good so far. Those are the two sides of the same coin and you cannot credit Arteta for the good signings while blaming Edu/Raul for the bad… Read more »
We are fucking dog shit