Martin Odegaard Carrying Injury as Mikel Arteta Delighted with Arsenal’s Intensity in Sheffield United Win
Arsenal closed the gap to Premier League leaders Tottenham back to just two points with a thumping 5-0 victory over Sheffield United at the Emirates on Saturday, with Eddie Nketiah bagging a hat-trick. In the absence of injured frontman Gabriel Jesus, Nketiah was tasked with leading the line and opened the scoring after collecting Declan Rice’s low cross and poking the ball into the bottom corner. He doubled his tally shortly after the restart, rifling home as United struggled to clear a corner, before completing his hat-trick with a stunning, powerful finish from the edge of the box which arrowed into the top corner.
Arsenal boss Mikel Arteta made four changes to his team for the visit of Sheffield United and despite saying pre-match that it was a simple case of ‘refreshing’ the line-up after a tough trip to Sevilla in midweek, he has now confirmed that skipper Martin Odegaard has been dealing with an injury niggle.
Martin Odegaard Carrying Injury
Asked about the decision not to play Odegaard at all on Saturday, Arteta replied: ‘Obviously we went through all the minutes that everybody has played in the last three weeks and some of them they played an enormous amount of minutes. Martin has been as well carrying a little thing and wasn’t very comfortable in the games. So we have players with enormous quality and we have to trust them, and we believed it was the right day to do so.’
Asked how tough the load has been on Odegaard recently, Arteta continued: ‘I think he has enjoyed a lot the last couple of weeks. They’ve been really good for the team, he’s playing every game. Yes, he had a difficult period with the national team because it was a big blow for them what happened, but this is football and he needs to get on with that and he is a massive player for us.’
Arsenal Maintained Intensity
Arteta was also pleased that his rotated side did not drop their intensity, saying: ‘Obviously they came from the national teams. We beat City, then they go to the national teams, we then had to go to Stamford Bridge and we did what we did with it at Stamford Bridge. And then you have to go to Sevilla, and that’s a really, really stressful week, with as well what they were experiencing in the last few weeks [with the national teams]. So then you can have the tendency to [relax] and go, “OK now we’re going to play at home” and that would have been the worst thing we could have done to compete against this team today.’
Conclusion
Arsenal’s win over Sheffield United was a huge boost in their pursuit of Premier League leaders Tottenham. Mikel Arteta made four changes to his team for the visit of Sheffield United, one of which was due to skipper Martin Odegaard carrying an injury. Despite this, Arsenal maintained their intensity and put in an impressive performance to secure all three points.
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