We are all well aware that the last few years have seen Arsenal struggling to cope with a lot more players and playing days missing due to various injury problems than any of our rivals. I remember seeing a chart last season showing the injury situation for Premier League clubs over the previous 10 years and I think only Newcastle United´s was worse than Arsenal’s.
Then Arsene Wenger admitted and addressed the issue and the early stages of the season suggested that the addition of another couple of fitness experts and whatever else had been done behind the scenes had got the Gunners sorted. Or that was the case until the last month or so when the injury list has been steadily growing.
So now we are back in the same old story and were all on tenterhooks while our international stars went off around the world to represent their countries. But is it really that bad for Arsenal at the moment? I would say not and here is why.
The club´s injury problems right now are as bad as they have been all season but as you can see from this injury chart on Just Arsenal it is far from being a crisis. There are seven first team players on the list but two of them, Bellerin and the Ox, are expected to be able to play some part in the game on Saturday. Two more, Walcott and Ramsey are due back in a couple of weeks, Wilshere says four weeks, Rosicky six and Welbeck eight.
And when you look at the rest of the Premier League clubs, our main rivals Man City also have seven players out while Man United and Liverpool have more. Arsenal may be in the top half of the table for injuries but if we do get two players back this weekend it will put us back in the bottom half.
So is there really an injury problem at the club or is this just normal wear and tear that you expect from a physically demanding sport?
Personally I feel we have made great strides in tackling these problems. We have brought in some of the best people possible and when they are not good enough we send our players over to see the Germans who are the very best in this field.
I doubt we could actually do much more, well one thing bothered me a little. Hearing about the hybrid training pitches and how that might be an issue, but this is only conjecture/opinion as we don’t know for sure.
I believe that in the future we will have less of these type of problems and our youngsters coming through will have better chances in avoiding the same type of problems their predecessors experienced. Unfortunately for some of our regulars they have become a little prone due to us being a bit slow in meeting with the issue.
Cmon we hv not improvd anything in terms of injury given that we hv important players who hv not playd since the season started not one nor two playrz and they dnt seem lyk they coming back soon we are hanging on a thread and a couple more injuries will leav us in a worse situation…at Arsenal injury updates are more important than transfer rumours!
@ Kotte, I’m with you all the way on this buddy. “Our improvement” in the medical room is all a myth if you closely look at the rate at which players are getting injured so early in the season. Other teams have injuries too but not as much as Arsenal. The worst thing is important members of the squad that can positively contribute to our success usually get injured at the same time.
Surely our medical / coaching team can do even better in this department.
Wilshere, Ox, Walcott, Gibbs, Rosicky, Welbeck, and recently Arteta … They are too much injury prone players, they rarely have a complete season without a long term injury … Wenger shouldn’t count on them and then come and blame his luck …
Too GooD: “Alexis Sanchez set to commit to a new 5yr deal worth £40miL”
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Okay now silly boys…….go Shop elsewhere
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The emirates maLL is cLosed!
Even thats a xxxxing rumour ??
Wenger is now saying that Sanchez and Ozil’s contract extensions can Wait!!! ?
That doesn’t surprise me one bit,
When you consider the amount of money wenger is saving by dragging it out.
It’s not just the number of injuries but the players it’s happening to. At the moment our team completely lacks pace, no running behind defenders no overlapping runs. Players like Walcott, Bellerin, Welbeck and OX give you that, but how on earth are they all injured at the SAME time??? These are the players that really make us dangerous. Cazorla and Ozil can do all the neat work in midfield, but there’s very little running in front of them. Giroud might be on a prolific run at the moment but I feel our whole game suffers. We’re virtually harmless to teams that try and press us because we have no players to carry the ball from midfield to attack.
Great run but suffers? Walcott and Sanchez on the wings in the attack. Those are the players that should run behind.
I remember reading an article on this website or another possibly linking the injury list with the nationality. When you look at all the players currently injured in the Premier League, you will see a significant number of British players, especially when you look at Arsenal’s injury list: Welbz, Wallcot, Ox, Rambo, Jack. And then turn around and look at the years behind us and you’ll see the same pattern(even though we lost both Giroud and Ozil due to injury last season for three months to counter balance the stats).
Young British players should not be put under such a physical pressure that they are now, since it doesn’t pay dividends. I mean, if any of our current injury friendly players manage to go through a season without being sidelined for at least a month I will claim there was a miracle and turn to Catholicism.
There is something in the water over there.