Mikel Arteta faces the biggest game of his managerial career to date as Arsenal go head-to-head with Manchester City on Wednesday. In what is one of the biggest top-of-the-table clashes in a title race for many a year, it may well be a case of winner takes all.
Pep Guardiola's side have continued to sweep through all those that come before them while the Gunners have started to crumble. That can be overturned with a positive result at the Etihad Stadium but it will have to be done without William Saliba.
The Frenchman is not expected to be fit to face City after The Athletic reported that his back issue is proving to be persistent at exactly the wrong time. Although some hope remains that he will play again this season, it is a major blow.
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Arsenal haven't kept a clean sheet in their last four league games since Saliba's injury, shipping nine goals in that period. "Regarding William [Saliba], we still have to wait a little bit more," Arteta said of the 22 year-old last week.
"He is not progressing as quick as we hoped. It’s a bit delicate and we want to be very certain when we push him that he is ready to absorb the load and the risk that we will take and at the moment that’s not possible to do."
Arteta ddded: "I don’t know [if it's season ending], it’s a bit early to do [predictions]. Probably next week we are going to have more certainty. There is some evolution, he is doing more activity, but he is not there yet to start to throw him on the pitch at the level that the sessions demand to compete in this league."
Whilse Saliba won't be available, Granit Xhaka is likely to return after missing the draw with Southampton having been taken ill. "This morning unfortunately Granit wasn’t feeling well so we had to get him out of the squad," Arteta said on Friday.
The Swiss international is expected to return to the midfield after Fabio Vieira deputised for him on Friday. Elsewhere Mohamed Elneny and Takehiro Tomiyasu are the only others out of the game with injury.
City themselves have a big hole to fill with Nathan Ake being substituted off against Bayern Munich last week with a hamstring strain. Guardiola hasn't ruled him out yet, saying: "I don't know. He's [Ake] not ready for tomorrow [Saturday] but I don't know the damage."
According to injury expert Dr. Rajpal Brar, he could be out for nearly two months. "Nathan Ake right hamstring injury," he tweeted. "Timeline depends the severity & location of injury (near tendon typically longer).
"Typically grade 1 is 1-2 weeks, grade 2 is 3-6 weeks & grade 3 is 10+ weeks depending on surgery or not. Higher risk for high pace players/positions."
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