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Team news: Arsenal handed injury boost ahead of BATE Borisov clash

By on February 20, 2019

aaron ramsey arsenal

Arsenal have been handed an injury boost with Aaron Ramsey back in contention to face BATE Borisov in the Europa League tomorrow evening.

Ramsey was forced to miss Arsenal’s 2-1 victory over Huddersfield Town after picking up a knee injury ahead of the game and the midfielder failed to recover in time to make the trip to Belarus last week.

However, Ramsey has returned to full training after overcoming the issue and is expected to be back in the squad for the visit of BATE to the Emirates on Thursday evening.

Alexandre Lacazette won’t be involved in the decisive second leg after foolishly getting himself sent off for throwing an elbow during the final minutes of the 1-0 defeat in Borisov last week.

Otherwise, we have no other concerns to worry about but Unai Emery will obviously still be without long-term injury absentees Rob Holding, Hector Bellerin and Danny Welbeck.

A team news update on Arsenal.com read:

Alex Lacazette
Suspended following red card against BATE Borisov (a).

Aaron Ramsey
Back in full training.

Hector Bellerin
Left knee. Recovering after surgery.

Rob Holding
Left knee. Recovering after surgery.

Danny Welbeck
Right ankle. Recovering after surgery.

Let hope Emery brings Ramsey or Mesut Ozil back in to the side as we lacked creativity in the first leg. I’d personally have both of them in my line-up but realistically Emery will only pick one at the most.

Ozil’s omission from the entire squad last week raised plenty of eyebrows and it would be madness not to recall him to at least the bench tomorrow night. We need goals and Ozil is comfortably our most creative player so let’s get him back on the pitch and book our place in the last-16.