Mikel Arteta offers update on Declan Rice after injury scare in Crystal Palace win
- Rice was withdrawn midway through the second half of Arsenal's comfortable 5-0 victory
- Midfielder appeared to suggest he had suffered a hamstring injury
- Centre-back Gabriel Magalhaes also went off late
By Tom Gott
Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta has admitted Declan Rice felt "tightness" in a muscle before his withdrawal in Saturday's 5-0 thumping of Crystal Palace.
The Gunners were three goals ahead and cruising when Rice left the field and cameras appeared to catch the midfielder mouthing "hammy" - a reference to his hamstring muscle - as he left the field to be replaced by Jorginho.
With Arsenal fans left sweating, Arteta confirmed after the game Rice's withdrawal was precautionary.
"He was feeling some tightness," the boss explained. "I don't know what muscle it was. But when he says that at 3-0 then obviously we don't want to take any risks."
Arsenal also lost centre-back Gabriel Magalhaes late on. The goalscoring defender left the field in the 81st minute after eventually succumbing to the impact of a tough challenge in the first half.
"He had some discomfort from a tackle in the first half and he was struggling a bit so it was the right moment to take him off the field," Arteta revealed.
WILL THE JANUARY TRANSFER WINDOW DELIVER?
Gabriel headed home Arsenal's opening goal on the day from a corner and also thought he had added the second, only to see the effort ultimately credited as an own goal from Palace goalkeeper Dean Henderson.
Having seen his attack struggle for goals heading into the game - Leandro Trossard and Gabriel Martinelli would find the back of the net after the break - Arteta admitted he was delighted to see set pieces bring an impact from his defenders.
"The reality is that we trained set pieces less in the last week than other aspects of the game," Arteta said. "This is the beauty of it. But we worked on a lot of things that actually happened and we trained them a lot.
"Really pleased with the clean sheet first, which is something that we’ve been lacking to win games with the amount of goals scored. And sharing the goals as well which I think is going to make a big impact on the team.
"[Gabriel] has got this ability and the timing and deliveries have been really consistent. Others like Willie [Saliba] have this capacity to score more goals. We don’t have 30-40 goals from someone so we need to share them. That is a good quality of the team."
READ THE LATEST ARSENAL NEWS, TRANSFER RUMOURS & GOSSIP
feed