Wenger has bemoaned Arsenal’s recent injury problems and they suffered further blows at the weekend as Francis Coquelin was forced off with a knee injury before his replacement Mikel Arteta was substituted with a calf problem. “We were 1-0 up in the 28th minute and then 2-1 down before the 45th, so our defending on that level was very, very poor”, Wenger was quoted as saying by the local media.
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Those fears appear to have been realised as Wenger has confirmed that Coquelin is facing a spell on the sidelines and while we should soon know more over an exact timescale, the boss says the midfielder is likely to be out for “the next few months”.
Mathieu Flamini has refused to blame Santi Cazorla for his penalty slip during Arsenal’s defeat at West Brom.
Arsene Wenger called on Arsenal to put their game in order for the must-win Champions League clash with Dinamo Zagreb.
And, speaking after the game, a clearly dejected Wenger said: “It was a bad afternoon, we missed a penalty, we gave a goal away on set-piece, that is flawless to make your afternoon a nightmare and we missed open goal chances”.
Yet if results go Arsenal’s way in midweek, they will travel to Olympiakos for their final group match on December 9 knowing a win could send them through depending on the margin of victory.
“We need to get the points on the board – it’s a tough league and it’s very tough when your home form has not been brilliant, which ours hasn’t been, but we’ve played a lot of the top teams”.
Unfortunately, Arsene Wenger also revealed that Coquelin will miss about two months with a knee injury.
Arsenal’s 3-0 win over Dinamo Zagreb last night, along with Bayern Munich’s 4-0 thrashing of Olympiakos, means the Gunners have to beat the Greek outfit by two or more goals in their last match to progress.
“It is of course a disappointment to lose him in the longer term but we have in the squad the players who can compensate”.
“I don’t know if I would have the support of anybody but I came out on that and as a result we had a doping control from UEFA on Friday”, he added. How much did it affect them?
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The 24-year-old French midfielder was one of the discoveries of the season in the second half of last year after returning from a loan at Charlton Athletic with Arsenal in the midst of an injury crisis.
