Shkodran Mustafi could be out for the rest of 2017 with his hamstring injury.

Mustafi was taken off in the 36th minute during Germany’s 5-1 World Cup qualifier win over Azerbaijan on Saturday night, leaving Arsenal fans wondering who on earth Arsene Wenger is going to play at the back against Watford.

As Daily Cannon reported earlier, the 25-year-old has been ruled out of the Premier League clash against the Hornets on Saturday. However, there’s little information around about how long the centre-back could be sidelined for. I guess it’s perhaps still too early to really tell.

At the moment, all we really know is that Mustafi was assessed by Arsenal’s medical staff on Monday and the defender has suffered a ‘hamstring injury’, which is a pretty vague term.

If it’s a grade 1 hamstring injury, it could take Mustafi just days to heal, according to the NHS website. However, if this was the case, while he might still have been ruled out of the Watford clash as a precaution, I think we would have been told not to worry by now.

This makes me think that it’s more serious.

A grade 2 hamstring injury can take weeks to recover from and can cause a loss of strength in the leg, which fits in with the way Mustafi pulled up when playing for Germany.

Grade 3 is much more serious and sometimes requires surgery, taking months to recover from. This is usually the case when the entire hamstring tears completely.

Hamstring injuries are the bane of some footballer’s existence. Just ask Michael Owen. Hopefully, our lad’s isn’t too bad but considering we’re Arsenal, it probably is.

A grade 2 or 3 hamstring injury means that we may not see Mustafi play for the Gunners again until 2018.