Mikel Arteta says Takehiro Tomiyasu is facing a couple of weeks on the sidelines having aggravated a calf issue during Thursday’s Carabao Cup semi-final defeat to Liverpool.
The Japan international wasn’t part of the squad that drew 0-0 with Burnley and is understood to have pulled out of his country’s upcoming World Cup qualifiers with China and Saudi Arabia.
It remains to be seen whether the full-back flies with his teammates to Dubai to take part in a warm-weather training camp or if he stays in London.
“Tomiyasu had an injury and we didn’t have anybody to play in that position against Liverpool,” explained Arteta on Sunday evening.
“He really wanted to push, he tried and he played the 90 minutes, and he felt it again. So he will be out for a couple of weeks.
“Right now he needs to recover, his only focus has to be to have the best possible treatment. To look after himself, and try to be available for us as quickly as he can.
“He will be out for a few weeks.”
In Tomiyasu’s absence, Ben White filled in at right-back while Rob Holding partnered Gabriel in the centre of defence. With Thomas Partey and Granit Xhaka banned and heavy legs seeming to affect some of the young players on whom we’ve been so reliant, the Gunners produced a ponderous performance against Burnley. The two dropped points do little for our top four chances.
“I saw them try right to the last minute,” reflected Arteta.
“They’re really tired, we know in the last four weeks that we had a really demanding and challenging situation because we didn’t have enough players.
“Some players have been sick, injured, trying to bring them back, trying to expose them onto pitches when they’re not ready, but I cannot fault how they tried, they certainly need some days off, but then we need to go back again and bring players back and start to work and start winning matches.”
This sounds a bit like what we did to Thomas Partey when he first arrived. This was one we couldn’t blame on squad depth, as both Chamber and Cedric were injured.
Shame we didn’t do what we did today though, with White moving across instead of risking Tomi.
I guess had we beat Liverpool it could have been considered worth the risk. As it is we lost and dropped points today and suddenly look very short
Arteta said we had nobody to play in that position.
Hasn’t Nuno played there this season, with Cedric and Chambers left on the bench?
Yup. Chambers and Tavares are workable options. Considering how off the pace Tomiyasu looked in the game, I find it impossible to believe he looked all right in training.
But Arteta seems to have lost trust in Nuno and Chambers might have been carrying a knock after the first game.
Tomi didn’t train before the Liverpool game, he came in without any sessions.
Um, that sounds like a great idea.
It was his idea! He knew we had no understudies & decided to play through the pain barrier to help the team out. Thankfully not having a game for 2 weeks will give him the rest he needs
Part of any manager’s remit is to talk their subordinates out of the stupid ideas they come up with.
So, our new signing and one of this seasons best players puts his body on the line for the cause, and in return he gets abuse from so called Arsenal fans on his social media
That sounds about par for the course. I really hate us sometimes.
It’s not an ‘us’ thing. It’s social media and the cnuts that it provides a platform for. Something happens you don’t like, post abuse on their SM.
So true. These idiots are a societal problem.
Can Xhaka play right back?
Xhaka can piss off, right back to where he came from
Interesting comment in that as soon as Xhaka returned from injury the results improved and we rose to 4th place in the table. Also we saw how Partey improved by forming a great partnership with Xhaka. After the Everton match we only lost one game when he started.
Don’t confuse me with the facts!
We won 4 games since his return. 1 against Norwich and one against 10 man West Ham. Don’t look too much into Xhaka’s influence
We scored 14 goals in those 4 matches and only conceded 1. Xhaka’s influence was immense
Why not. He was great at left back……
[thinks Mikel Arteta to himself]
At least the Filth and West Ham lost,
If Arteta does not make signings and we fail to qualify for europe I think you can kiss Arteta good bye.
There is no excuse for it – he has known for a long time we would be short and yet he continued his pursuit of Vlahovic who has made it clear he is not interested.
Not a great believer in “the process” myself just yet – it has to achieve things for it to be trusted.
Eight days to go..
Agreed. Top 6 should be the minimum. That was a fair goal at the start of the season. He has been heavily backed in his decisions and in bringing players in. At some point the excuses, disclaimers and abundance of patience need to be set aside for results. The table position at season’s end (about 3 years) should be that time.
I made inhuman noises upon listening to this.
So we’re short at both right-back and defensive midfield positions? So how come we’ve just sent AMN out on loan?
Still scratching my head
To say we are short on right fullbacks when we had tomi, cedric, white, ainsley and chambers is something bemusing.
There should have beeb two solutions to this problem:
Arteta has been far too nice in the market and we’re yet to see how costly this is going to be.
In the recent past I remember a cup game against Newcastle, the game went into extra and we let Tierney play the whole game while he was recently back from injury and was a very important player. We beat Newcastle and in the next round we put out a weaker team and lost in the next round. I wish we let Tomi rest so he can play in the PL games. In situations like this we need to prioritize whats more important. I rather end up higher in the table than win the carabao.
Bring back the Corporal from Down Under!