The Spaniard is guaranteed to be without skipper Martin Odegaard, and could also be missing Bukayo Saka. It's the absence of William Saliba that is causing him the biggest issue though.
Arsenal handed strong VAR and red card warning before Liverpool with referee claim made
Saliba is suspended after his red card at Bournemouth last weekend. The Frenchman's absence leaves Arteta needing to pick a new right centre back for the first time since May 2023.
Riccardo Calafiori and Jurrien Timber are both contenders to fill the role, but both are huge doubts for the game. Calafiori has a race to be fit after picking up a knee issue in Tuesday's 1-0 over Shakhtar Donetsk in the Champions League. Timber, meanwhile, is nearing a return after nearly a month out with a muscle problem picked up in the 2-0 victory over PSG.
Arteta is set to give both full-backs as long as possible to be available for the game, but admitted that the uncertainty is likely to give him a sleepless night ahead of Sunday's match.
"Normally I prefer to go to bed with the line up in my head so I can sleep like a baby," he said in his pre-match press conference. "But sometimes it can not be as you have to wait for the next day. Sometimes two days before. Or just three days before you already have the idea 'against this team this is what I am going to do' but when you have uncertainty with injuries that is tricky."
Arteta does have options to replace Saliba if Timber and Calafiori are unavailable. Thomas Partey can drop into the right-back position, while Jakub Kiwior has filled in for Saliba in the past when Rob Holding wasn't up to the role. Oleksandr Zinchenko is also an option to play at left-back, while Hale Ender Myles Lewis-Skelly could make his first Premier League start.
For Arteta, though, the big fear is too much tinkering. He has admitted that it is enough to cause him to have stomach troubles.
"It is not just the backline but the midfield, the front line," he said. "When you don't have options, what do you do? You get in the shoes of the players and every time you make a decision it is a positive one for somebody and not so positive for another one?
"You have to deal with a human player and that's what causes a little bit of tummy ache if anything."
Arsenal handed strong VAR and red card warning before Liverpool with referee claim made
Arsenal could fall seven points behind Liverpool if they are to lose on Sunday. Arteta insists it's too early for title talk, though.
"That's the way we try to behave every single day," Arteta said on keeping positivity regardless of the result. "If we could be four points ahead, that's still not going to change the season because we've been there in that situation as well. We can probably learn from it as well.
"But the possibility is tomorrow - let's have a beautiful day on Sunday when we really perform. We are who we are and we will demand the game in the manner that we want. This has to be entrenched in our team."
0 Comments