Declan Rice’s injury has been a big talking point ahead of Arsenal’s game against Aston Villa.
The Gunners have had a great season so far in terms of results, but injuries have once again caused havoc in Mikel Arteta’s squad.
The Arsenal manager hasn’t had a fully fit squad available at his disposal all campaign, and during the win against Brentford, Rice suffered what appeared to be a calf injury.
Arteta has now shared an update on the midfielder and a few others in his pre-Aston Villa press conference.
Declan Rice limped off vs Brentford and it’s exposed Arsenal’s biggest problem…
Mikel Arteta shares injury update on Declan Rice, Cristhian Mosquera, William Saliba and Leandro Trossard
Declan Rice is arguably Arsenal’s most important player right now.
The England international has been immense for the Gunners this season. He has performed brilliantly in every single game and is one of the first names on the team sheet each week.
Rice has had a gruelling time at Arsenal recently. He started intense games against Tottenham, Bayern Munich and Chelsea in the space of seven days and played well in all of those fixtures.
Then, less than three days later, the former West Ham captain started against Brentford again, and he went down in pain in the second half after hurting his calf.
Reports revealed that Arsenal didn’t expect Rice to miss the game against Aston Villa. Arteta has now shared an update.
Speaking in his press conference ahead of the game, he said, as per The Telegraph’s Sam Dean on X: “Let’s see [on Rice]. We have another training session in the afternoon. Every hour is going to be important.
“Mosquera [ankle] is the one that is more complicated. We have another test today. Saliba and Trossard are a matter of days.”
That suggests that Rice could be in contention to face Villa on Saturday.
Arsenal need to sign a backup for Declan Rice
Arsenal have the best squad in the Premier League.
Arteta has two options in every single position, which is great, but the problem is that the Gunners have nobody like Rice in their entire squad.
That is a problem if the Englishman is ever unavailable, which is why Andrea Berta needs to bring in a young midfielder to play as a backup for Rice.
If you could sign one midfielder from any club in the world to join Arsenal as a backup for Declan Rice, who would it be and why?
However, there aren’t many players in world football who can do what the Arsenal number 41 does. Finding someone like him could prove to be almost impossible.
That is the challenge for Berta now, and if his work at Arsenal so far is anything to go by, we think he will find a perfect backup for Rice.
It will be interesting to see who that player will be.
Receive a digest of our best Arsenal content each week direct to your mailbox
