The latest Arsenal injury news as Champions League football returns, including updates on William Saliba, Bukayo Saka & Martin Ødegaard.
Arsenal get their Champions League campaign underway on Tuesday evening when they travel to the Basque Country to face Athletic Club in the first of eight league stage matches – but they may be missing several first team players when they board their flight.
Mikel Arteta could still be without William Saliba and Bukayo Saka while Martin Ødegaard lasted only 18 minutes over the weekend before having to go off with an injury. We’ve got the latest updates on their conditions as well as the latest on all of Arsenal’s stricken players below, along with their expected return dates when available.
Will William Saliba or Bukayo Saka be fit to face Athletic Club?
Centre-back Saliba trained on Friday ahead of Arsenal’s 3-0 Premier League win over Nottingham Forest but wasn’t included in the eventual match day squad as he recovers from a sprained ankle.
That injury, sustained in the opening minutes of the defeat to Liverpool, kept Saliba out of the French squad during the international break but he is very close to a return and has a chance of playing in the Champions League on Tuesday. Failing that, he should be in the line-up for the coming weekend’s game against Manchester City.
The game against Athletic Club is likely to come too soon for Saka, however. The England winger is recovering from a hamstring injury and while Arteta has described his rehabilitation as “evolving really well”, the Arsenal head coach also suggested that he was a short way away from returning to action, saying that the club had to “respect [the] process”. The game against Newcastle United on 28 September is a more realistic target.
Saka will almost certainly not make the trip to Spain and remains highly doubtful for a potentially crucial trip to the Etihad. Arsenal should be able to call upon a fully fit Ben White, however, after the former Leeds United defender returned to the bench having recovered from an unspecified muscular injury.
Is Martin Ødegaard injured?
The weekend provided a new injury concern when club captain Ødegaard was forced off less than 20 minutes into the match against Forest having apparently aggravated a shoulder injury which he had only just returned from.
Arteta described the issue as “very similar” to the problem which he picked up during the 5-0 win over Leeds, adding that “we have to assess him with the doctors and see but I'm sure he will try his best to be fit for Tuesday.”
Arteta did play down fears that Ødegaard could require surgery on the injury, suggesting that Arsenal’s medical staff believed the problem to be far less severe. Without a more detailed prognosis as yet, however, the Norwegian remains a significant doubt for Tuesday night’s match.
Another Scandinavian midfielder whose participation is in doubt is summer signing Christian Nørgaard, who picked up an unspecified injury during pre-season and has yet to make his debut. Arteta had previously suggested that he would be available shortly after the September international break but he was not selected for the Forest match and as such continues to be a doubt.
Elsewhere, Arsenal will still be without the services of Kai Havertz, who is expected to be out until November as he recovers from knee surgery, and striker Gabriel Jesus, who is likely to be back from an ACL injury in December or January, depending on the progress of his rehabilitation.
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