Arsène gave an interview with the official site today prior to the players giving him the bumps and the birthday cake being served.
For Sunday’s game against West Ham we can expect Eduardo to be in the squad, Rosicky and Bendtner are 50/50 to feature, Walcott is definitely out. Samir Nasri “probably needs another game, against Liverpool” before he can be fully in the first team, so I suspect he might not feature on Sunday even on the bench.
On the long term front Denilson is another 4 weeks away, but Johan Djourou won’t be back until March which is a long time away and a shame for the young Swiss defender who would have been a good backup and probably have been called upon in a rotational sense by now.
Arsène was also asked which of our three keepers we might see at the weekend. He mentioned that Fabianski needs some more time but he was very hesitant on who might feature. He stuck with Mannone on Tuesday as “Manuel was not fully ready” and “Mannone had not let us down”. It remains very interesting as to what is going on on the goalkeeping front.
