Players, Robin Van Persie & Thomas Vermaelen add to Arsenal woes

It seems like just when things couldn’t get any worse for Arsenal, they just managed to. This is because it is now being reported that after failing to win the Carling Cup, Arsenal are
now going to have to try and go through most of March without the services of Robin Van Persie and Thomas Vermaelen. It seems like Van Persie’s knock to his knee in the game against Birmingham this past Sunday was a whole lot more serious than initially thought
and the doctors have stated that the player will take a minimum of three weeks to recover. On the other hand, it seems like Vermaelen’s mystery injury just got a whole lot more severe and the player will not be fit to play till April.

Of course this would not have had such a dramatic effect on the outlook of Arsenal’s season considering they managed to come rather well in the absence of the duo for most parts of the
season. However, the fact that Arsenal has to face Barcelona in their second-leg Champions League encounter next week. Van Persie played a very crucial role in helping Arsenal secure the win over the Catalans in the first-leg and he was supposed to be the
man to lead the team from the front in Spain. However the player will be in a race against time and his health to try and make that match. However at the moment it seems like, if Van Persie can just pull himself together as soon as possible, then perhaps he
could still help Arsenal mount successful challenges in the FA Cup and the Premier League – of course this is considering they lose out to Barcelona in the Champions League. Which when thought about wouldn’t be too bad, since landing a trophy at the end of
the season is now the utmost priority at the club.

There is however a ray of hope at the end of a very dark tunnel that Arsenal have found themselves in. It now seems like Arsenal’s captain and midfield general, Cesc Fabregas might just
recover in time to face his childhood club.

This comes as rather brilliant news to most Arsenal fans due to the fact that Arsenal have often seemed to go astray in the absence of their captain. Considering they are to be without
several key players in their upcoming games, it would be a major boost to have Fabregas on site to hold things together.

However the biggest challenge at hand for Arsene Wenger is to evolve the team around the players that he has present. Considering Marouane Chamakh has been given ample time on the bench,
the Moroccan forwards time to prove himself as a worthy Arsenal squad member is finally here. It is obviously not going to be an easy task to try and emulate the form and class that Van Persie had been displaying in recent weeks, but, considering Arsenal don’t
have any other real options at the moment, they are going to have to put their faith in the tall striker.

At the same time Vermaelen’s setback would have very little effect on the Gunners for the remainder of the season, mainly due to the fact that the team has learnt how to survive in the
absence of their best defender and will be able to do so for another month.

The views expressed by the writers are his own and do not reflect the editorial policy of www.bettor.com