Arsenal will not be able to call upon William Saliba when they welcome Liverpool to the Emirates Stadium on Sunday.
William Saliba is suspended for this Premier League encounter as he was sent off in Arsenal’s recent defeat against Bournemouth.
As such, Mikel Arteta will have to reshuffle his defensive contingent when his side take on the Reds. Not only will the Gunners not have Saliba in his usual station alongside Gabriel Magalhaes in the heart of the rearguard, but they will be without the injured Riccardo Calafiori too.
Jurrien Timber is also a fitness doubt for this fixture, meaning the Arsenal defence could have a very unfamiliar look this weekend.
The Gunners might have avoided being without Saliba, though, had they gone through with their plan to appeal against his red card.
Arsenal prepared to appeal William Saliba red card
Saliba was dismissed for denying a goalscoring opportunity. This was not the initial opinion of referee Robert Jones on the pitch though, who showed the 23-year-old a yellow card.
However, following a VAR review, the defender’s punishment was upgraded to a red card.
Former Arsenal winger Theo Walcott agreed with this decision, but plenty of figures within the club did not, and a plan was formed to push back against the punishment.
As reported by the Daily Mail, Arsenal analysts were tasked with compiling a “video montage” of similar incidents from other matches that were not deemed worthy of a red card.
The Gunners amassed a weight of evidence but ultimately opted against lodging an official appeal, as it was felt that it was too likely to fail.
Arsenal discipline problem
Rather than the focus being on appealing against decisions that have already been taken against the club, the focus at the Emirates Stadium needs to be on addressing their obvious disciplinary problem.
The Gunners have already had three players dismissed in Premier League games this season, with Declan Rice and Trossard having been given their marching orders earlier in the campaign, against Brighton and Manchester City, respectively.
Regular sendings off is a bad habit Arsenal have suffered under Arteta before, before the manager was able to rectify his team’s behaviour. The problem has crept back in though and is now an issue that the manager must address again.
Arsenal will be targeting the title this season, but they will fall short of this aim if they fail to get their discipline under control.
Receive a digest of our best Arsenal content each week direct to your mailbox
