Arsenal face West Ham in their first home game of the season and will be looking to pick up where they left off at Fulham, so who is fit and available to face the Hammers?

After one game of the season, Arsenal sit proudly on top of the Premier League table and the injury table with eight players out.

Shkodran Mustafi is still out with his torn hamstring, Pablo Mari is still recovering following ankle surgery, while Calum Chambers and Gabriel Martinelli are both still recovering from their respective knee injuries.

Emile Smith Rowe is in a sling after he injured his shoulder in training, although the club are hopeful he will be able to get rid of that at the end of next week. The sling, not his shoulder.

David Luiz is still recovering from neck spasms with no return date given.

Granit Xhaka is being assessed after picking up an ankle/foot knock against Fulham while Sokratis, who also missed the game against Fulham is expected back in training this week.

It was a calf injury that kept him out of the game at Craven Cottage but it’s likely to be an impending transfer that will keep him out of any more Arsenal games.

The same is true of Lucas Torreira who is currently sidelined with an acute case of transferitis. The club say it’s a slight injury, Torino’s €24m bid says otherwise.

Others are available but probably won’t play for various reasons.

Emi Martinez is available but will probably be an Aston Villa player by the time Arsenal kick-off against West Ham.

Mesut Ozil is available but probably won’t get selected, as usual.

William Saliba is also available but, as Mikel Arteta explained, is not ready for the Premier League just yet.

Everybody else, at the time of writing, is available to face West Ham and you can view our Arsenal predicted lineup here.

We will update if that changes. You can keep up-to-date with the latest Arsenal injury news here.

West Ham injuries

According to PremierInjuries.com, West Ham do not have a single injured player. Not even Jack Wilshere. Thinking that seemed unlikely, I checked the West Ham website who report that they expect midfielder Tomas Soucek to return in time for the Arsenal game. Then I noticed that article was from 6 March.

That was the last time West Ham seemed to have issued an injury update prior to David Moyes pre-Arsenal press conference in which he confirmed that Mark Noble would miss out with a toe injury nd Jack Eilhere had an ankle problem, had  scan and was back out training.

Jack Wilshere may or may not be fit but he is unlikely to feature, having been omitted entirely from West Ham’s opening day squad for their 2-0 home defeat against Newcastle. It seems West Ham are trying to cancel Wilshere’s contract which still has another year left to go. Manuel Pellegrini convinced the West Ham board to offer Jack a three-year deal as an optimistic ‘show of confidence’ in both the manager and player.

Pellegrini was sacked 17 months later while Wilshere has played just 18 times for the Hammers since moving there just over two years ago. He has managed one goal and one assist in his 747 minutes of West Ham football, 1,200 minutes fewer than he played while on loan with Bournemouth.

Wilshere played the full 90 minutes in his first three Premier League games after moving to West Ham in the summer of 2018. He hasn’t played the full 90 since and has suffered both a groin problem (221 days/22 games missed) and further ankle issues that needed more surgery (201 days/31 games).

Arsenal vs West Ham: Head-to-head record

Arsenal host West Ham on 19 September and will be dreaming of replicating the women’s 9-1 win over the same club this weekend, but how have things gone for the men throughout the history of this fixture?

Arsenal and West Ham first played each other in January, 1906, when then-Woolwich Arsenal drew with the Hammers 1-1 in the FA Cup. James Sharp scored from the spot for the Gunners.

The Arsenal starting XI that day was: Jimmy Ashcroft, Archie Cross, James Sharp, Percy Sands, James Bigden, Andrew Ducat, Roddy McEachrane, Bobby Templeton, Billy Garbutt, Tim Coleman, and Tom Fitchie.

Arsenal won the replay 3-2 at West Ham five days later on 13 January with the exact same lineup apart from Tom Fitchie, who was replaced by Charlie Satterthwaite who scored one of Arsenal’s goals. Garbutt and Ducat scored the others.

Arsenal have won seven of their last 10 games against West Ham, drawing two and losing just one and scoring 23 goals while conceding nine.

Arsenal have lost only two of their last 26 games against West Ham, one home and one away.

Arsenal have lost three games in a row to West Ham twice, once in a run between 8 March 1975 and 29 November 1975 (Cup, Division One, Division One) and then again between 1 February 2006 and 7 April 2007 (all Premier league), the first two when they were managed by Alan Pardew and the third under Alan Curbishley.

Arsenal’s record vs West Ham

Played 142

     Arsenal wins 68

     West Ham wins 35

     Draws 39

Arsenal vs West Ham / West Ham vs Arsenal Head to head results

Fulham vs Arsenal, Premier league, 12 September 2020 pre-match injury news

Arsenal start their 20/21 Premier League campaign this weekend against newly-promoted Fulham, so who is fit and who is out ahead of the game?

Arsenal looked like they would go into their first Premier League game of the season in relatively good health until their latest announcement added another three players to the injury list.

Then the Guardian reported on Friday night that Martinez will not even be in the Arsenal squad for the game.

Until this week, the only players who were missing were long-term injuries. Pablo Mari is still recovering from his ankle surgery, while Gabriel Martinelli is out until the end of 2020 with a knee injury, as is Calum Chambers. Shkodran Mustafi’s torn hamstring will keep him out of training until at least October.

David Luiz, meanwhile, seems to have a ‘neck complaint’ that is both vague and worrisome.

In his article on the Athletic [£], Ornstein gives few other details about what happened, writing simply, “The 33-year-old defender’s participation is in serious doubt because of a neck complaint that could rule him out for an extended period. Rob Holding is now likely to stay at the club instead of joining Newcastle United on loan.”

However, he then adds that “a late decision is expected to be made on his availability,” which doesn’t sound as serious as it does above.

We all expected Dani Ceballos to still be in quarantine ahead of Fulham vs Arsenal but he played against Aston Villa during the week meaning he should be available for this weekend’s game.

As Lucas Torreira moves closer to the exit door, it seems unlikely Mikel Arteta will use the Uruguayan if he has other options. Mohamed Elneny could be one of those if Arteta has been able to do to him what he’s done to a few others like Emi Martinez, Dani Ceballos and Ainsley Maitland-Niles.

William Saliba and Gabriel Magalhaes are also fit and available for selection although rumour has it the latter might need a little more time to settle in.

Willian should also be involved, but whether that is from the start or not, we will just have to see.

Arsenal also confirmed on Friday morning that David Luiz, Sokratis Papastathopoulos and Emile Smith Rowe will miss the game against Fulham this weekend.

Is Mesut Ozil available?

Not only is Mesut Ozil fit and available for Fulham vs Arsenal, he might even get some minutes on the pitch.

The German hasn’t been seen in a competitive Arsenal match since before the lockdown but he took some part in Arsenal’s behind-closed-doors friendly against Aston Villa this week and has made it clear he’s ready to be selected.

With Ozil refusing to leave the club and nobody else able or willing to pay his wages, Arsenal may hae no choice but to play the man they pay £350kpw and have been trying to force out the door.

Thankfully, it’s something Mikel Arteta probably wants to do.

Fulham vs Arsenal – The opposition

Central midfielder, Stefan Johansen is currently suffering from an ankle/foot injury and appears to be the only Fulham player with a problem, but if that changes I will update ASAP.

Speaking to the press, Fulham manager Scott Parker said of Arsenal, “I think they could be a big force this season.

“There’s no denying the quality Arsenal have, the players they have.

“Mikel’s done a fantastic job in a short space of time with his team, so I think this year’s a big year for Arsenal.

“The quality in their ranks is vast, and you’ve seen that in the last few months, and when they won the FA Cup as well.

“But like always, like we did last year and we will this year, we’ll prepare for this game to try and get a result. We’ll prepare for this game to try and hurt them where we feel we can punish them.

“It will be the same for them, we understand their threats and where they can hurt us, and we’ll try to counteract that and try and limit them.”