Mikel Arteta has admitted the uncertainty over his back four ahead of Arsenal’s Premier League clash with Liverpool is likely to give him a sleepless night.
The Spaniard is guaranteed to be without skipper Martin Odegaard, and could also be missing Bukayo Saka. It’s the absence of William Saliba that is causing him the biggest issue though.
Saliba is suspended after his red card at Bournemouth last weekend. The Frenchman’s absence leaves Arteta needing to pick a new right centre back for the first time since May 2023.
Riccardo Calafiori and Jurrien Timber are both contenders to fill the role, but both are huge doubts for the game. Calafiori has a race to be fit after picking up a knee issue in Tuesday’s 1-0 over Shakhtar Donetsk in the Champions League. Timber, meanwhile, is nearing a return after nearly a month out with a muscle problem picked up in the 2-0 victory over PSG.
Arteta is set to give both full-backs as long as possible to be available for the game, but admitted that the uncertainty is likely to give him a sleepless night ahead of Sunday’s match.
“Normally I prefer to go to bed with the line up in my head so I can sleep like a baby,” he said in his pre-match press conference. “But sometimes it can not be as you have to wait for the next day. Sometimes two days before. Or just three days before you already have the idea ‘against this team this is what I am going to do’ but when you have uncertainty with injuries that is tricky.
