Arsenal: Arteta dealt another injury blow


Arsenal have been dealt yet another injury setback ahead of their Premier League meeting with Tottenham Hotspur on Saturday afternoon.

What’s the latest?

That’s according to Kaya Kaynak, with the football.london journalist revealing in a recent post on Twitter that, despite only recovering from an injury that saw him miss FC Zurich and Brentford fixtures prior to the international break, Cedric Soares has now sustained a fresh injury that will rule him out for between one and two weeks.

In his post, Kaynak said: “Cedric Soares has picked up a fresh knock and will be out for a week or two. Really unlucky for him just after coming back from an injury that saw him miss FC Zurich and Brentford before the international break.”

A dilemma for Arteta

While it is true that Cedric is not exactly a guaranteed starter at The Emirates – having been an unused substitute four times already this season – considering the fact that both Takehiro Tomiyasu and Ben White are also injury doubts for the north London derby this weekend, the loss of the Portugal international will nevertheless come as yet another blow to Mikel Arteta, who could now have a big dilemma over his options on the right-hand side of defence.

Indeed, should both Tomiyasu and White be ruled out of Saturday’s clash, Cedric’s unavailability will leave the Spaniard with no natural right-back for the visit of Tottenham – something that, considering the fact Spurs’ left-winger, Heung-min Son, is coming into the fixture on the back of a sensational second-half hat-trick last time out, would represent a disaster for the 40-year-old.

And, despite not being first choice, the £5.4m-rated full-back nevertheless impressed over his 21 Premier League appearances last season, scoring one goal, registering one assist, creating two big chances and keeping three clean sheets, as well as making an average of 1.8 tackles, 0.8 interceptions, 0.9 key passes and winning 3.0 duels per game.

These returns saw the £75k-per-week defender average an extremely respectable SofaScore match rating of 6.86, ranking the 31-year-old as Arsenal’s joint 15th-best performer in the top flight of English football last time out – proving his importance within the Gunners’ squad.

As such, the unavailability of Cedric will certainly come as another blow to Arteta ahead of Saturday’s fixture, with the Spaniard already missing Mohamed Elneny and Emile Smith Rowe, while Thomas Partey, Kieran Tierney, Tomiyasu and White are also doubts for the meeting with Arsenal’s most fierce of rivals.





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