Arsenal beat Shakhtar Donetsk 1-0 at the Emirates to stay unbeaten in the Champions League this season, but lost defender, Riccardo Calafiori, to injury in the second half, adding to their growing list of potential absentees against Liverpool on Sunday in the Premier League
Mikel Arteta says Calafiori’s suspected knee injury is “not great news” for Arsenal ahead of Sunday’s crunch game against Liverpool in the Premier League – live on Sky Sports.
The defender is being assessed by Arsenal after coming off injured in the second half of their 1-0 win over Shakhtar Donetsk at the Emirates Stadium on Tuesday night following an awkward fall.
Left-back Calafiori, who was replaced by teenager Myles Lewis-Skelly, is the latest player on Arsenal’s growing list of potential absentees ahead of a huge game in the league against leaders Liverpool.
“He had to come off because he felt something,” Arteta said of Calafiori after the game. “I don’t know the extent of it so in that sense not great news.”
Arsenal will be without William Saliba in defence through suspension after his red card at Bournemouth, while Jurrien Timber has not played since the start of the month due to an injury.
Arteta is also unable to call on defensive duo, Takehiro Tomiyasu and Kieran Tierney, because of long-term injury issues, leaving him with limited options against Liverpool if Calafiori and Timber are unable to recover in time.
Martin Odegaard is another that remains out, while Bukayo Saka has missed the last two games with a hamstring problem, picked up with England. His injury status will be a huge focus in the coming days.
Arteta did not seem hopeful about Saka’s chances before the game. “I don’t know, he wasn’t able to train yet, so that’s unlikely,” he told Amazon Prime.
Ben White was removed at half-time against Shakhtar after picking up a booking and Arteta clarified after the game that this was only done to prevent another sending off for his side, rather than because of an injury.
“It was my decision to take him out,” said Arteta. “He had a yellow card and we’ve played enough with 10 men in recent periods. They had a lot of density on that side, a lot of players on that side, so I didn’t want to take any chances there.”-Skysports