Arsenal have been suffering considerably with injuries throughout the season and continue to be missing key figures like Bukayo Saka and Gabriel Martinelli. Now Kai Havertz has added to that list and will miss the remainder of the campaign following hamstring surgery.
Saka and Martinelli are working hard to be back in the coming weeks and months, but there remain plenty of matches for Mikel Arteta to navigate in the meantime. It will require plenty of outside-the-box thinking with limited attacking options available to him.
However, in other areas of the team, he has been blessed, touch wood, with a rarity of availability. In fact, there are two players he now has access to who have perhaps been forgotten to some degree.
Both Jurrien Timber and Myles Lewis-Skelly have made the right and left, respectively, full-back areas their own. They have climbed the ranks and taken advantage of absences to establish themselves and impress in their showings.
Lewis-Skelly has been a welcome addition and, at just 18 years of age, is a very exciting prospect for both Arsenal and England. A midfielder by trade, his inverted role in the left defensive position has suited Arteta’s style perfectly.
Timber, meanwhile, started life with Ajax as more so a centre-half, but his technical ability has seen him develop nicely into one of the league’s best right-backs. He does, however, lack the offensive traits traditional right-backs have given sides, but the right-attacking pod of Martin Odegaard and Saka has often offset that in the earlier stages of the campaign.
The return of two key figures to the group, though, has changed things for Arteta. After arriving in the summer and suffering three different injuries, Riccardo Calafiori is starting to find more rhythm and consistency.
He has contributed some big goals against Manchester City and Wolves and offers a different type of profile to the left side of defence. With the schedule still very congested, Calafiori can rotate seamlessly with Lewis-Skelly to offer rest and variation.
Back at the weekend against Leicester, Ben White made his long-awaited return from a knee procedure, aiming to correct a problem plaguing the last two years. White does indeed offer the overlapping skill that has perhaps been missing from the side.
He, too, could bring depth to the right centre-half role and play with Timber to offer William Saliba some respite. Arteta will be keen to reintroduce both and find ways to utilise their differences with those who have started in their stead in recent months.
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