Jesus on being no9, injury updates & more: Arsenal news roundup 18/8/22 | OneFootball

There isn’t that much going on as we wait for Mikel Arteta’s pre-Bournemouth press conference, but here’s a roundup of what’s making the headlines today.

Match

Arsenal travel to Bournemouth this weekend, hopeful that they can maintain their winning start to the season.

A cleansheet from Aaron Ramsdale will go along way to help that and the Arsenal keeper is assured of a warm reception when he returns to the club he made 37 appearances for.

News

Beth Mead has been named as one of the final three in UEFA’s Player of the Year Award. Mead is nominated alongside Wolfsburg and Germany’s Lena Oberdorf and Barcelona and Spain’s Alexia Putellas. The winner will be announced on 25 August at a ceremony in Istanbul.

Arsenal have signed Lina Hurtig from Juventus. The 26-year-old Swedish forward will wear the number 17.

Gabriel Jesus has been speaking to ESPN Brazil about his new role at Arsenal.

“I started playing much more on the wing at City and for Brazil,” Jesus said. “For a while I thought that. But I’ve changed my mentality, I believe much more in myself now. I’m smiling again playing football.

“I’m very blessed as I can play across all front three but I am a No.9. I am there to finish our chances. Not only that but to help the team as a whole. It’s normal to pick up and think that you can’t play with 9, that I’m a winger.”

Injuries

Reiss Nelson is out for the foreseeable future with a quad injury. If all goes well, he should be back again in around two months.

Fabio Vieira finally got to pull on an Arsenal shirt, albeit for the u21s against Swansea in the Premier League Cup.

With the number 7 on his back, Vieira played 45 minutes in their 2-1 win on Wednesday night.

Cedric Soares and Emile Smith Rowe also featured. Arsenal’s goals came from Joel Ideho and Cedric (from a free kick) after the Swans’ Josh Thomas had given the visitors a lead.

It was revealed in the Amazon: All or Nothing documentary that Kieran Tierney picked up his knee injury getting out of the shower.

“The Wolves game, he had a hyper-extension injury, finished the game, didn’t mention it and then played the next five games with no problems whatsoever,” Arsenal doctor Gary O’Driscoll said in the penultimate episode of the series.

“But he then walked out of the shower on Thursday after training, turned a corner, bent his knee and felt the knee collapse.”

Pundits and Gossip

Rio Ferdinand has said that Arsenal finally have the ‘next Luis Suarez’ in Gabriel Martinelli despite the youngster being an incredibly nice person who has shown no interest in biting opponents.

Nice might finally provide an answer to Arsenal’s Nicolas Pepe problem. His agent was spotted there recently and they are believed to want to take the winger on loan.

The Mirror report Arsenal are chasing Wolves’ Pedro Neto.

Brighton’s Moises Caicedo, whom Arsenal are said to be interested in, is also wanted by Manchester United whom, just last season, Caicedo said it was his dream to play for.

The Mirror also report that Aston Villa want Rob Holding. They cite Estadio Desportivo as their source, but the Spaniards get their info from “a report from England” which seems to have come from a freelance sports journalist, Owen O’Brien.

Nobody seems to know who he is, he doesn’t have a website, and doesn’t link to any published work on his Twitter account that has 3.6k followers. Nor does he mention any publications he’s had bylines in.

Former players

As we reported, former Arsenal youngster Daniel Ballard, has suffered a broken foot. Sunderland have now ruled him out for the ‘foreseeable future’.