Playing in the England U21 team against Lithuania on Tuesday, Keiran Gibbs came out of the game injured with a suspected broken metatarsal according to early reports.
The truth is that International breaks are a necessary duty for those players who choose to participate and frankly cannot be eradicated from the football calendar for as long as we have the World Cup and other FIFA approved continental competitions. Consequently players’ getting injured during these breaks is highly inevitable. Every team goes through this. Top goal scorers come back injured, and most times for long periods of time. Arsenal is no exception to this unfortunate scenario.
What I believe has been Arsenal’s Hercules heel in past seasons has been lack of mental strength collectively as a team and in some cases individually for whatever reasons you can conjure. And historically the month of November has been the expose month, especially after these infamous Internationals have claimed its casualties.
It’s the lack of mental strength that explains the final minute lapse in concentration that gifts a minimum of 2 to 3 points to the opposition. Or the inexplicable reasons why it seems that 80 mins isn’t enough time to rescue a point after falling behind early on in matches over and over again. Or the absence of the “never say die until the fat lady sings” attitude even if placed on a field with electric currents.
Even though the team has shown glimpses of the past in a few matches this season, it is very obvious that we have a much more improved side with a lot more resilience and maturity. I also believe that if all the first team regulars had played more games together, the stronger we would have been. But with the number of injuries and ‘new’ players coming in as replacements, ultimately a new formation will need to be considered by the Professor.
With the likes of Van Persie, Diaby, Walcott, Clichy, Vela, Wilshere, Traore, Denilson, Bendtner, Gibbs and Djourou all out to injuries, it must be demoralizing to the rest of the team to see a good number of their first regulars on the sidelines. The thoughts of ‘why us again’ or ‘why now when we were doing so well’ could probably prevail in the minds of the players or on the training ground.
The true test for the improved Gunners at this very moment will be to continue in the very good form they had been prior to these injuries with the ‘replacement players’.
This means getting results away at intimidating grounds against hard grinding teams such as Sunderland this coming Saturday the 21st of November.
Can the rest of the players step up to the plate and carry the team on it’s back until it’s healed enough to begin walking again? Can they rise above the demoralizing situation and birth character to ensure that no injured player is missed in the team? Can they show the mental strength to do what it takes to ensure we remain in second place with a game in hand?
The true test is here and now!
UPDATE: Gibbs suffered a bruised bone and not a broken metatarsal as earlier reported.
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