Arsène Wenger gave some worrying news on Alexis Sánchez after the Chilean helped Arsenal to a 3-0 win over Manchester United.

Two first half goals from the forward gave Arsenal a commanding lead but he couldn’t grab a hat-trick in consecutive Premier League games.

There’s no doubt Alexis always wants to play the full 90 minutes, so it was a concern to see him leave the field with nine minutes to go. Kieran Gibbs replaced a limping Alexis. We enter an international break now, but that provides little comfort.

“He has a little groin problem,” Wenger said in his press conference. “Unfortunately he goes to Chile.

“You cannot stop him from going to Chile and he loves so much to play for his country and he will play against Brazil [on Friday] and Peru [next] Tuesday so the game at home against Brazil he will not want to miss.”

That doesn’t sound good. Almost any other player would surely pull out of the squad, but Alexis isn’t any other player.

The forward plays until he can’t run any longer, and it may just come to that. Arsenal have just seen Alexis hit form – he has six goals in three games – the last thing we need is for him to aggravate an injury on international duty.

“Hopefully he will come back in good shape.”

Amen to that, Arsène. Alexis clearly wants to play but fingers crossed he and Chile head coach Jorge Sampaoli are sensible about it if he has an injury.