Thomas Partey will miss Arsenal’s trip to Tottenham on Sunday after Mikel Arteta confirmed the midfielder will be out for a ‘few games’.
Partey has been out since suffering a thigh injury during the early stages of Arsenal’s defeat to Aston Villa earlier this month and he was immediately withdrawn from the Ghana squad for their African Cup of Nations qualifiers.
Arsenal had initially hoped the 27-year-old would recover during the November international break and be ready in time to make the trip to Leeds United last weekend.
However, Arteta said after the draw at Elland Road that Partey’s injury was ‘significant’ and the Gunners boss has now confirmed the former Atletico Madrid star will be out for ‘the next few games’.
Speaking after Arsenal’s disappointing 2-1 defeat to Wolves at the Emirates Stadium on Sunday night, when asked for an update on Partey, Arteta told Arsenal.com:
I don’t think he will be with us in the next few games.
It means Partey will miss Arsenal’s Europa League group stage clash with Rapid Vienna on Thursday night and Sunday’s huge North London Derby away to Tottenham Hotspur.
The Gunners then travel to Dundalk for their final Europa League group stage match before further league games with Burnley, Southampton and Everton before Christmas and it sounds like Partey might not be involved in those games either.
The news will come as a huge blow to Arsenal as Arteta is under increasing pressure to get their campaign back on track following their third consecutive Premier League defeat last night.
Arsenal desperately need a positive result against Tottenham next weekend and Partey will be a huge miss in the middle of the park as Granit Xhaka and Dani Ceballos were extremely poor against Wolves on Sunday.
We’ll have to wait and see how long the Ghanaian international is out for but Arteta will be praying he makes a swift recovery as Arsenal currently languish down in 14th place in the table having lost five of their 10 league games so far.
