Arsenal Pre-Everton Team News & Injury Update: Rosicky, Mertesacker & Fabianski

Arsenal will look to cement third place in the Premier League table when they welcome fellow top-four hopefuls Everton to the Emirates on Tuesday night.

The Gunners jumped up to third with a 3-1 win over Norwich on Saturday but can extend their lead over Chelsea and Tottenham to four points on Tuesday, while defeat for the Toffees would also be a huge dent to their top-four hopes.

Ahead of the game, boss Arsene Wenger had given Arsenal.com a team news and injury update with the latest on Tomas Rosicky and Lukasz Fabianski as well as confirming Per Mertesacker will return to the squad after completing a one-match ban at the weekend.

The good news is that play-maker Rosicky returns after missing the Norwich clash with a minor hamstring strain, but the bad news is that goalkeeper Fabianski is a ‘major doubt’ after taking a knock to the rib and will be assessed on Tuesday ahead of the game.

Here is what the boss told the clubs official website:

on the latest team news…

Mertesacker and Rosicky are back in the squad for tomorrow.

on Lukasz Fabianski…

Fabianski is a major doubt but we will decide that tomorrow [Tuesday]. He got a kick in the rib [against Norwich City].

Rosicky’s return is a big boost as I think we missed his urgency in the middle of the park on Saturday. It will be interesting to see what line-up Arsene goes with but I can’t see how we can play Arteta, Wilshere, Rosicky, Ramsey and Cazorla all in the same team, so who’s going to miss out?

Jack didn’t look fit at all on Saturday and Rambo was arguably MOTM, but does Wenger have the balls to drop Wilshere for such a big game? Would it be the correct call? Personally, I think the boss will drop Ramsey, which he doesn’t deserve after his performance against Norwich, but it’s so difficult to leave out Wilshere or Rosicky.

If Fabianski misses out it’s also going to be VERY interesting to see if Szczesny comes back in. He hasn’t even made the bench for the last two games so i’m not sure how the boss can recall him to the first team straight away, which may leave the door open to Vito Mannone.

The other area of contention is centre-back and whether Per Mertesacker returns, and if so, does Vermaelen get dropped again? I think we’ll see Mertesacker come back in, mainly because he’ll be needed to deal with the aerial  threat of Fellaini, but who misses out is anyone’s guess.

Now we’ve seen the team news, what would be your line-up for the Everton game? Leave your suggestions in the comments section below.