BREAKING NEWS: Fess hours to title deciding match, another key Arsenal defender have sustained injury in training session this morning and is now ruled out of City game
Manchester City face Arsenal today in a game that could be crucial in deciding who wins the Premier League title.
Win today and City will be just three points behind the Gunners. Beat Burnley on Wednesday and they will leapfrog Mikel Arteta’s side into first place.
Very few gave City a chance of winning the league this season, and so to even be in with a shot of reclaiming their crown heading into the final few weeks of the campaign is an achievement in itself. But having slowly started to reel Arsenal in, Pep Guardiola will want his side to finish the job and today could be key.
Ahead of a huge game in the title race, we’ve rounded up the latest Arsenal injury news as Arteta faces a number of problems:
Noni Madueke
Madueke pulled up in Wednesday’s clash with Sporting and was replaced by Max Dowman. Arteta hopes he could be available for today’s game, saying on Friday: “Well, we have another training session tomorrow, so he didn’t look that bad after the game and he was quite positive.
“He’s a player that pushes through pain so I’m hopeful that he can be available, but we have to wait and see if he’s able to join tomorrow.”
Potential return date: Sunday, April 19 v City
Bukayo Saka
Saka is definitely out of today’s game, with Arteta saying at his pre-match press conference: “Bukayo is out, that is for sure.
“Hopefully he recovers very soon because he is a tremendous player. He is starting to do some stuff, let’s see how quickly he can be with us.”
Potential return date: Unknown
Mikel Merino
Merino is another who has definitely been ruled out of the Etihad clash, with Arteta simply saying “out again” when asked for an update on Merino ahead of the match.
Potential return date: Unknown
Martin Odegaard, Riccardo Calafiori and Jurrien Timber
Arteta didn’t go into specifics when asked about the trio, but all three are touch-and-go for today.
“Some players are quite close but the turnaround is short so we will try tomorrow to push everybody and if they are in good condition they will be part of us and if not they won’t,” Arteta said on Friday. “They haven’t been there in the last few weeks unfortunately.”
Potential return date: Sunday, April 19 v City
