Jurrien Timber is now very close to making the Arsenal squad, and he’s not even completely out of contention for Manchester City on Sunday.

Chris Wheatley reports on ShotsTV that Arsenal’s Jurrien Timber is hoping to be back in the squad for one of the upcoming games, and there’s still a possibility he could make it in time for the squad to face Manchester City.

But Wheatley highlights that Timber was absent for Arsenal’s recent behind-closed-doors friendly against QPR, which would seem to make a return on Sunday less likely.

“He’s very close,” Wheatley said of Timber (via TBR). “He’s hoping to be involved in one of the upcoming games. He could be named in the squad for Man City of course, it’s always a possibility.

“He wasn’t involved in the behind closed doors friendly against QPR over the international break, that only included Thomas Partey and Takehiro Tomiyasu, but there was no Jurrien Timber.”

You’d think if Arsenal planned to include Timber in their squad at the Etihad Stadium, they would have given him a run-out in that friendly match first.

Ideally, Timber could also have built up some minutes with the Arsenal u21s, but that hasn’t actually been possible recently.

The u21 match against Blackburn Rovers on March 16th was postponed to April 22nd, so there hasn’t been a game since March 8th, three weeks ago.

There’s certainly no expectation that Timber will start against Manchester City on Sunday, and even an appearance on the bench seems like a long shot at this stage.

But there’s evidently hope that the defender’s comeback isn’t too far away, which is excellent news as we approach the key final games of the season.