Arsenal players on international call-up. Who might be returned injured?

 

 

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By Tony Attwood

Arsenal has players in a wide range of international matches that are being played in the coming days.   And indeed one such game has already been played: Belgium v Serbia, except that as far as I can see Trossard didn’t play.   So that is 400 air miles on the round trip thus far for no purpose.

So one game down and no injuries so far.  But today there are more games and more chances of Arsenal players being damaged by international managers who are, in Mr Wenger’s famous words, like car thieves who take your car, drive it recklessly, damage it, hand it back and tell you to have it repaired and ready to go again before the next round of internationals.

Thus I thought it might be worthwhile to set up DANGER CHART as well as counting the miles

Also already completed is the Japan v Myanmar world cup game in which Tomiyasu was called up, and yet once more didn’t play.  He was, we were told, “fatigued”.    That is a return trip of 11900 air miles, giving us a running total of 15900 air miles.

Mo Elneny has been picked to play for Egypt even though he is not playing much for Arsenal and their game against Djibouti is later today.  That is 4688 miles return.   So rounded up we are on 20,600 air miles.

David Raya has been told to report for Cyprus v Spain.  That is 2600 miles, meaning we now up to 23200 air miles.

Karl Hein is Estonian and he has been selected for his country’s game against Austria in Tallinn.  That’s 2200 miles return so that makes it 24,200 air miles.

Rúnar Alex Rúnarsson is on loan to Cardiff to he’ll have flown from there to Slovakia for the Iceland international game away to Slovakia, which is a nice short trip of just 930 miles so that is 1860 return which takes us up to 27,000 miles.

Now of course as you will appreciate the players are not always flying back home after the first trip, because they will often fly on to the next venue and then back home.  What’s more those five games are not the only games because the games continue through the so-called “international break” which for the players is nothing remotely like that.

We have only counted five players so far for one match each and got to 27,000 miles and there are another 18 games to go,   So we have another set of matches to take into account, and by a very rough and ready calculation I reckon that will take us up to … well a lot.  Sometimes the players might travel together (as with for example Gabriel, Martinelli, and Jesus going to Barrangquilla in Columbia for the match on Friday against Brazil.   And Ramsdale, Rice and Saka only have to get to Wembley for England against Malta, also on Friday and probably won’t fly.

With a very rough and ready calculation, I think our players will be knocking up over 100,000 air miles, but even with some travelling together and some shorter routes that is still going to be a lot of mileage.

And just in case you want to catch any of the games, or indeed work out exactly how many airmiles might be involved, and who can share a lift with whom, here are the rest of the matches

November 17

• Colombia v Brazil (Gabriel, Martinelli, Jesus)
• Poland (Kiwior) v Czechia
• England (Ramsdale, Rice, Saka) v Malta
• Italy (Jorginho) v North Macedonia

November 18

• Germany (Havertz) v Turkey
• France (Saliba) v Gibraltar (that will be a tough one for France)

November 19

• Sierra Leone v Egypt (Elneny)
• Sweden v Estonia (Hein)
• Spain (Raya) v Georgia
• Belgium (Trossard) v Azerbaijan
• Portugal v Iceland (Runarsson)

November 20

• North Macedonia v England (Ramsdale, Rice, Saka)
• Ukraine (Zinchenko) v Italy (Jorginho)

November 21

• Syria v Japan (Tomiyasu)
• Poland (Kiwior) v Latvia
• Austria v Germany (Havertz)
• Greece v France (Saliba)

Wednesday, November 22

• Brazil (Gabriel, Martinelli, Jesus) v Argentina

There are around about 15 Arsenal players involved give or take a few, and goodness knows how many of those are going to come back injured.

But I wonder, do all these international associations plant lots of trees to help save the planet which with their silly competitions they are so regularly helping to destroy?