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Arsenal dealt untimely fresh injury blow, 24-year-old ruled out

By mac14 on January 29, 2017

According to the Mirror, Arsenal have been dealt an untimely injury blow with the news that Mohamed Elneny has suffered a calf injury while away on international duty.

Elneny has been at the Africa Cup of Nations with Egypt this month and helped his country ease in to the quarter finals with a vital Group D win over Ghana.

The 24-year-old was expected to start in tonight’s last-8 clash with Morocco but he was left out of the squad and the Mirror claim that the Gunners star has suffered a calf injury in training.

The newspaper says that Egypt officials have confirmed the news but they refused to divulge any further details or give any indication as to how serious the injury is.

Elneny’s injury comes at a nightmare time for Arsenal as we’re down to the bare bones in central midfield with Santi Cazorla out for at least another month with an on-going achilles injury while Granit Xhaka has just started a four-game ban.

Elneny’s absence leaves us with just Aaron Ramsey and Francis Coquelin to choose from as our regulars in midfield as we head in to a pivotal part of the season that sees us play vital games against Watford, Chelsea and Hull.

We’ll have to wait and see how serious Elneny’s injury is but he’s set to miss the Chelsea game irrespective of his calf problem as Egypt have just beaten Morocco 1-0 to reach the semi finals of the AFCON.

They’ll now play their last four clash at the start of February before playing in either a third-placed play off or in the final itself – which takes place on February 5th – the day after our trip to Stamford Bridge.

So it looks like we’re going to have to go with Ramsey-Coquelin for the next few games. Although saying that, Oxlade-Chamberlain has made himself a viable option after starring in the middle of the park during our thrashing of Southampton yesterday.