All Arsenal fans had known that Alexis Sanchez was due to suffer a hamstring injury a long time before it actually happened as we had numerous warnings over the previous six weeks, so it was no surprise when he finally succumbed against Norwich in November.
We all agreed then that it was about time we gave the Chilean a rest anyway and we were resigned to be without our Duracell bunny for the next three weeks. Alexis was sent back to his national team medical team for treatment, and sure enough on the 13th December he flew back to London, and Arsene Wenger said that he would have six days to prepare him for our game against Man City.
But wenger did not name Sanchez in the squad against our title rivals, and after the game Le Prof revealed that Alexis had had a “minor setback” and would now miss the busy Christmas period but would be ready for the New Year games which was expected to start with this weekend’s cup game against Sunderland. It was unlikely that Wenger would have played him for the full 90 minutes but it would have been nice for him to get a bit of a run out before being thrown back into the fray, but yet again Wenger has announced that our Duracell Bunny’s batteries are still not fully charged and ready to go.
Le Prof said yesterday: “The bad news of the week is that Alexis is not quite ready,”
“It is a precaution because of his hamstring, and it takes a few more days. He’s not bad but he’s not ready.”
So now we are all expecting him to be fit for Wednesday’s big game against Liverpool, but we will have to wait and see, going by our previous experiences with Wenger’s forecasts. His expected three-week break has already going to be seven weeks by Wednesday.. And counting…..