Arsenal boss Mikel Arteta has provided a fitness update on two key stars on Sunday.
Arsenal faced off with London rivals Chelsea in a pre-season friendly in the early hours of Sunday morning.
The Gunners came out on top on the day thanks to some well-worked goals from Bukayo Saka, Gabriel Jesus, Martin Odegaard and Albert Sambi Lokonga.
Martin Ødegaard makes it 2-0 against Chelsea! 🔥@ESPNPlus pic.twitter.com/Z9eVDOzk8e
— ESPN FC (@ESPNFC) July 24, 2022
Following the game, Mikel Arteta was asked about the back-four he used vs Chelsea, which saw Oleksandr Zinchenko handed his debut and Ben White deployed at right-back.
When quizzed on how impressed he was with the aforementioned back-four, Arteta said: “At the moment Tierney and Tomiyasu are not fit, we have other options, but I think it was good to try different things, to build some relationships in big matches, and I’m happy with the way they played.”
On Tomiyasu, he added: “Yeah, Tomi is really close to start doing some training sessions. Hopefully next week and Fabio [Vieira] probably a little bit longer.
Arteta also give his verdict on Zinchenko’s debut: “He was desperate to play and I knew that. It was a maximum 45 minutes but you could see straight away he was comfortable.
“He understands everything that I want, he understands the process and I thought he had a really good game.”
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