Morning everyone. After a lot of speculation about William Saliba’s back injury over the last few weeks, the one thing we definitely knew was that he had a big problem. Whether it would require surgery or not, and how long he’d be out for, were uncertain. The reports varied, which is why it was interesting to see Arsenal address it yesterday by releasing a statement. I’ll reproduce it here, because the link on the website may or may not work: William Saliba has returned to us from World Cup duty, where he played an integral role in France reaching the semi-finals of the competition. Subsequent specialist reviews on William’s return to London this week have confirmed that he has suffered a back injury which will require a period of rehabilitation. Extensive assessments have concluded that surgery is not recommended, but William should now commence a managed recovery programme. William’s rehabilitation will commence immediately, with continual management of his injury, and he is expected to be out of action for an extended period. Everyone is fully focused on supporting William to ensure he is back to full fitness as soon as possible. For a club which typically plays its cards very, very close to its chest when it comes to play fitness/injury issues, this is quite unusual. Although, when the player goes down in a World Cup semi-final, and the lip-readers tell us he said ‘My back is gone’, I don’t suppose you’re letting loose some tightly guarded secret. I guess the fact no surgery is required is probably a good thing, but regardless, he’s going to miss a lot of the upcoming season and that’s a significant blow. Saliba is one of the best players in the world in his position. Unquestionably world class. It’s often a difficult thing to define, but in this instance anyone who has eyes and watches football could tell you it’s true. Unless they’re an idiot (and there are always some of those). Put it this way, if you offered any club in the world the opportunity to have this player tomorrow, there isn’t one that would turn it down. Unless they’re idiots. The question now is what do Arsenal do? Clearly some cover is required, and the names mentioned thus far are Ezri Konsa of Aston Villa, or John Stones, the 32 year old former Man City defender who is out of contract and available on a free. Last week I outlined my concerns about him and the injuries he’s had for the last couple of seasons which have seen him miss around 50 games in the last two campaigns. If you think Saliba is going to be relatively short-term, he might be worth taking a risk on, but as we know back injuries are notoriously difficult to put a time-frame on. It’s not like a muscle strain or even a broken bone, those things tend to be quite defined in terms of their recovery period. Can you rely on someone of that age, with that injury record, to be available to stand in for one of your most important players? It’d be a gamble, in my opinion. Konsa plays centre-half and right-back, so makes sense for a manager who likes versatility in his players, but the issue is Villa want a big fee, and as I said previously, this is a player who, when Saliba is back to full fitness, will essentially be a back-up option. Can Arsenal justify a large transfer outlay for a player like that? If it’s not outrageous, it’s probably the safer of the two deals as he doesn’t have anything like the fitness issues of John Stones, and we already have two defenders, Ben White and Jurrien Timber, who have tricky injury histories themselves. Maybe three if you include Riccardo Calafiori, although he plays on the other side. They can’t be the only two options, obviously, and you would hope that those tasked with squad building would have at least considered the idea that a player who was nursed through the last part of the domestic season, and who was then going away to a World Cup, ran the risk of breaking down because of that problematic back injury. We have Cristhian Mosquera, of course, and both White and Timber can play centre-half, so perhaps there’s a way to add someone who could provide cover at right-back and lean into the existing options. Whatever we do though, it’s another level of complication to this summer we could probably have done without. The Morgan Rogers thing. The Bruno Guimaraes thing. The losing one of our best players to a back injury thing. The accumulated fatigue of Declan Rice thing. The Bukayo Saka Achilles thing. The nobody seems to want to buy any of the players we’d quite like to sell thing. Lots of things. You can understand why people are feeling a bit antsy about this summer so far. Nevertheless, things – such as they are – can change quickly, and the mood with it. I do think during this period of the off-season there is a tendency to over-index the problems, the glasses are generally more half-empty than half-full, but no there’s question Arsenal have plenty to do. The squad needs to be improved, we haven’t really begun to do that yet (although the Christos Tzolis announcement today is a step in that direction), and there some pretty hefty problems to be solved. Right, I’m gonna leave it there for this morning, and for some extra reading, here’s Tim on 20 years of the ‘new’ stadium. 20 years! We will have an Arsecast for you in a little while so stand by for that. Have a good one. The post No surprise on Saliba’s ‘extended’ absence, but how do Arsenal react? appeared first on Arseblog ... an Arsenal blog.