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TEAM NEWS: Wenger Provides Latest Ahead Of Marseille Clash

By on November 25, 2013

Arsenal welcome Marseille to the Emirates tomorrow evening and a win could see us secure safe passage to the knockout stages of the Champions League.

The boss held his pre-match press conference earlier today and much of the talk centered around the fact Thierry Henry and Robert Pires were training with the club, but Wenger ruled out re-signing either of them.

He also gave the latest team news and it looks like we’ll have a very similar squad to the one that saw off Southampton at the weekend. The only major addition sees Mathieu Flamini return from a domestic ban.

Mikel Arteta was forced off late on against the Saints but Wenger didn’t give any update on him specifically, and he stated that everyone was fit from the weekend, so we have to assume Mikel is OK.

That said, I’d still like to see the Spaniard given a rest and start Flamini alongside Aaron Ramsey in midfield – as I pointed out in my preferred line-up for the game.

The only other piece of injury news was that Wenger also confirmed that Lukas Podolski is still a few weeks away from being in contention to make his first team return. The German forward has missed the last three months with a hamstring tear but returned to full training at the end of last week and will continue to work on his fitness before being considered for first team duties again.

Here’s what Wenger told Arsenal.com:

on the team news for Marseille..

Everybody from Saturday is available and of course Flamini is available as well because he’s back from suspension.

on Podolski training…

It’s not the first time he’s trained but he is still a few weeks away.

It’s great [to see him back] because he is a quality player. He can score goals, he can play in different positions, like centre forward and on the flanks.

That is vital for us, to get everybody back.

We’re slowly getting our squad back together and there’s little doubt the bench is looking a whole lot healthier than it was a few weeks ago. We now have genuine options available to change games and that’s only going to make us stronger over the coming months.

What team would you start tomorrow?