Arsenal On The Brink Of Defensive Crisis

Arsenal On The Brink Of Defensive Crisis

There cannot be a possible worse start to the season than what Arsenal endured on Saturday, with them losing their opening game at home to Aston Villa while also seeing yet another defender Kieran Gibbs join the injury list.

There was an atmosphere dominated by nervousness as Arsenal walked out onto the pitch on Saturday as they got the new English Premier League season underway. The club had not performed in the transfer market as they promised and as they were expected to do. Arsenal fans were looking forward to a summer of change where their club will manage to tear away from their usual pattern of losing top players every summer, and instead to bring some top players this time around.


They only managed to get in Yaya Sanogo in the off season and on the other hand, an exodus of fringe players left the club. So much so, that Arsenal were reduced to the bare minimum in terms of first-team
players. They currently just have 14 fit senior players, and they head to Turkey to face off against Fenerbahce on Wednesday in the crucial Champions League qualifiers.

To add insult to injury, they already have the likes of Thomas Vermaelen, Nacho Monreal and Mikel Arteta out injured. There was no scope for any further injuries, as Arsenal will the struggle to just fill up the numbers in the vital clash on Wednesday night. However that is exactly what has happened, as Daily Mail report that left-back Kieran Gibbs suffered a nasty looking wound on the head, which cut open brutally following an aerial clash against Aston Villa’s Andres Wiemann yesterday.

Arsenal are currently without any left-back at the club, and will be forced to deploy young Carl Jenkinson as makeshift defender against Fenerbahce. Further, they will be without Laurent Koscielny for the next league game following his harsh sending off yesterday. He is suspended for one game, piling up to their woes, though he is available for Wednesday.

With everything collapsing around manager Arsene Wenger, how do you see the Frenchman dealing with this situation? Will he go into panic mode and resort to a few quick buys to steady the ship? We can’t see it happening as it would be totally against his methods.