Marquinhos missed Arsenal’s final training session ahead of their clash with PSV due to illness, with three others absent on Wednesday.

In a story reminiscent of Gabriel Martinelli’s situation last week, Kaya Kaynak reports that Marquinhos was unwell this morning and missed training, but he could still be in the Arsenal squad tomorrow.

Last Wednesday, Martinelli missed training due to illness, but he still made the squad at home to PSV, coming off the bench in that match.

Mikel Arteta will hope Marquinhos ends up being available on Thursday in the same way, but it’s evidently not guaranteed.

Unfortunately, it seems pretty certain Oleksandr Zinchenko won’t be involved, as he missed training once again on Wednesday. The Arsenal summer signing is still recovering from a calf injury and clearly isn’t ready for match action yet.

Emile Smith Rowe and Mohamed Elneny were also absent, though that was to be expected. Smith Rowe isn’t meant to return until after the World Cup, and Arsenal aren’t expecting Elneny back until 2023.

With the games coming so quickly one after another, perhaps it’s inevitable we get more of these little knocks and illnesses keeping players out of training.

They’re under more stress, for a start, but it’s also true that we simply might not hear about every little illness and fitness setback if there weren’t so many games on.

Arsenal are travelling to the Netherlands today, so we may find out whether Marquinhos has joined the group later this evening.