Online Reporter
Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta has criticised the club’s Premier League schedule after midfielder Declan Rice and centre-back Cristhian Mosquera became the latest players to pick up injuries during Wednesday’s 2-0 home win over Brentford.
The North London club are already without first-choice centre-backs William Saliba and Gabriel Magalhaes, as well as forwards Kai Havertz and Leandro Trossard. Mosquera limped off just minutes before half-time with what Arteta said was either a knee or ankle issue, while England international Rice was substituted in the 83rd minute because of a calf problem.
“Obviously it’s never good news. Declan had to come off. We have to see tomorrow what he’s got,” Arteta told reporters.
“Mosquera is the other one that is out. Obviously we have big Gabi (Gabriel) and Willy (Saliba) out as well. So we have to adapt. It’s been a theme of this season.
“(Rice) could not carry on playing, so we have to wait and see tomorrow what happens … he can walk but he cannot play.”
Arsenal next visit high-flying Aston Villa on Saturday before taking a trip to Belgian side Club Brugge in the Champions League on December 10. Arsenal, who top the Champions League standings, regained their five-point lead at the top of the Premier League thanks to Mikel Merino’s early goal and a late one from substitute Bukayo Saka against Brentford.
“Now we play Wednesday night and we have to play Saturday morning as well,” Arteta said. “So we can play minutes, but if they can please give us just a little bit more time to recover and to make the well-being of these players a little bit easier, that would be great…
“Give us another day, especially the teams that are playing so much in Europe.
“To everybody in general, I think we can do that because we’re going to benefit from that.
“We’ve never had such a schedule at every level, not only in the Premier League, but every competition internationally as well. So we need to try to do that, please.
“It’s not an argument, I think it’s common sense. I think it’s not at some point this becomes too much, you know, and the players are not machines. But we have to try to do that when we can.”
Meanwhile, Arsenal re-established their five-point lead at the top of the Premier League with a 2-0 home win against Brentford on Wednesday and for the second evening running the goals flowed as Aston Villa won 4-3 in a thriller at Brighton and Hove Albion.
Mikel Merino’s 11th-minute header gave Arsenal the lead, but they needed a stoppage-time goal by substitute Bukayo Saka to make the points safe on a night of hard graft in which they stretched their unbeaten run in all competitions to 18.
Manchester City had cut the advantage to two points on Tuesday with a wild and wacky 5-4 victory at Fulham but Arsenal responded in calm fashion to move to 33 points from 14 games.
Aston Villa are up to third with 27 points after Ollie Watkins scored twice as they came from two goals down at Brighton to claim a fourth successive league win.
Chelsea’s hopes of staying in range of Arsenal suffered a big blow as they went down 3-1 at Leeds United to slip to fourth on 24 points, one ahead of Crystal Palace who are fifth after Daniel Munoz gave them a 1-0 victory at struggling Burnley.Champions Liverpool failed to build on their victory over West Ham United at the weekend as they needed a late own goal by Nordi Mukiele to grab a 1-1 draw at home to Sunderland — a result that left them in eighth place, 11 points behind Arsenal. — Reuters.
