Quantcast
Home   >   News   >   TEAM NEWS: Wenger’s Update On Ozil, Ramsey, Giroud, Bendtner, The Ox & Gibbs

TEAM NEWS: Wenger’s Update On Ozil, Ramsey, Giroud, Bendtner, The Ox & Gibbs

By on January 3, 2014

Arsenal welcome Tottenham to the Emirates on Saturday evening for our FA Cup third round clash.

Arsene Wenger held his pre-match press conference this morning and gave an update on several of our injury concerns.

The big worry is who will start up front after Nicklas Bendtner damaged his ankle after scoring the opening goal against Cardiff City on Wednesday. The boss confirmed the Dane had a scan on Thursday and the club will assess the damage before revealing how long he’ll be on the sidelines for.

The good news is that Olivier Giroud has recovered from his own ankle knock. However, the bad news is he picked up a sickness bug last night and is laid-up in bed so is “90 per cent” certain to miss the Spurs game.

While we have problems up front, we might be able to call upon Mesut Ozil after he missed the game on New Year’s Day with a should injury. The German is due to have a late fitness test but has trained today so it looks likely he’ll be involved.

Aaron Ramsey is still out with a thigh strain while Kieran Gibbs is also still unavailable so Nacho Monreal will continue at left-back, and Wenger also revealed that Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain will return to full training next week after several months out with a knee injury.

This is what the boss told Arsenal.com:

on Bendtner…

What I can tell you is that from the last game we lost Nicklas Bendtner. We don’t know how serious his injury is at the moment because he had a scan yesterday. His scan will be assessed today.

on Giroud…

For the rest, Giroud’s ankle was quite positive yesterday in the test but he was sick overnight so he has a 90 per cent chance of being out. He is in bed today.

on other injuries…

Ozil will have a test later, personally I think he will be short. Gibbs and Ramsey are definitely out.

on Oxlade-Chamberlain…

He is close to being back in full training, next week. It takes a little time to be competitive again.

Some have suggested we will rest key players for the game in order to keep them fresh for the league. However, Wenger insisted today that he will treat the Spurs clash as a ‘top league game’ and will resist any temptation to play a weakened side.

I sincerely hope this is the case as the last thing we want is to crash out the FA Cup at the first hurdle, especially to the scum from the Lane.

We have 9 days rest before our next game against Villa so we have no excuse not to play all the big-guns. Let’s play the first team and we’ll teach them a lesson. COYG!!!