The current star of the Arsenal team Alexis Sanchez was on international duty again last night and he helped his Chile team mates defeat Uruguay in a hard fought Copa America quarter final to book their place in the semi-final. But he was lucky to come through the game unscathed as Uruguay put themselves about and launched some ferocious tackles on their opponents.
Alexis even revealed after the game, as reported by the Daily Mail, that one of the Uruguay players had apologised to him later in the game for basically targeting the Gunner with the rough stuff.
Alexis said, “They like to fight, argue, go forward all out; one player told me in the first half “Move you wimp” but then later he said to me: “I am sorry”
“He said to me, ‘That’ll do, I kicked the s*** out of you’. And I said, ‘Alright but you could have caused an injury and that’s not what football’s about.'”
At least Chile do not have to face Uruguay again but winning that game means they will have two games left even if they lose the semi-final to Bolivia or Peru and that means he will be missing the start of the season even if he does avoid injury. And you can be sure that the Arsenal star will be one of the Chile players singled out for treatment.
Another will be the excellent Arturo Vidal, rumoured to be an Arsenal transfer target. The Juventus midfielder took an awful challenge just before half time and I thought he might have to be replaced. I hope that Wenger really is trying to sign the Chilean midfielder but that will not happen if someone does put him in the treatment room. How stressful is this tournament Gooners?