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Arsene Wenger offers injury update on Arsenal duo

By on December 8, 2016

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Arsene Wenger has offered a brief update on the fitness of two of Arsenal’s long-term injury victims; Per Mertesacker and Danny Welbeck.

Mertesacker is yet to play a single minute of competitive football this season since damaging knee ligaments during our pre-season match against Lens back in July.

The defender has undergone an intense rehabilitation programme back in his native Germany over the past five months but he returned to north London last week and was seen back out on the training pitches at London Colney on Monday.

Mertesacker was only doing light individual training with the coaching staff but he’s vowed to get himself fit soon and be in contention for a first team place next month.

Welbeck has been on the sidelines for even longer than Per as he suffered serious knee ligament damage during our game with Manchester City at the end of last season.

The attacker has endured a long, hard road to recovery after also spending much of 2014/15 on the sidelines through injury but he too is eyeing his latest comeback after returning to light training.

Wenger has been speaking to the media at his press conference this morning ahead of Saturday’s clash with Stoke and admitted that Mertesacker and Welbeck are ‘recovering well’, but says the pair are still a few weeks away from returning to action.

Given how long the duo have been out for, they are going to need several weeks of training to get their fitness back up to speed and Arsene may also consider playing them with the under-23’s before bringing them back in to the first team fold.

Therefore, I don’t expect either Welbeck or Mertesacker to be available until well in to the New Year, but it will be a big boost when they do return and I’m sure both will play a role during the second half of the season.