Unai Emery says he thinks Shkodran Mustafi will be alright after the defender suffered a hamstring problem, forcing him off in the second half against Huddersfield Town.

After losing Rob Holding and Aaron Ramsey to injury against Manchester United on Wednesday, Mustafi added to Arsenal’s injury woes by coming off in Sunday’s match clutching his leg. It appeared to be a hamstring issue, which Emery confirmed after the match, but he insisted the prognosis looks good.

“Yes (it was a hamstring problem), but I think he will be OK,” Emery confirmed. “Now, I don’t know how we are going to play next week, but we have players. Stephan played at centre back today and had a good performance in Manchester with good commitment. Koscielny is also coming back, Nacho Monreal too. We’ll have players.”

It has started to become a bit of a worry who Arsenal are going to play next week. Whether he recovers from his hamstring issue or not, Mustafi won’t be available to face Southampton, as he’ll be suspended. The same goes for Sokratis Papastathopoulos.

Nacho Monreal’s return comes at just the right time, and Emery’s decision to use the Spaniard as a centre-back in a back-four over Laurent Koscielny on Saturday shows he has faith in the full-back to play the position. If Koscielny can get 45 competitive minutes under his belt against Qarabag, he could well be available to start as well.

Stephan Lichtsteiner started the match against Huddersfield, but he appeared to come off as a response to his centre-back partners picking up suspensions. It wasn’t worth risking picking up an injury to rule him out as well. As a result, Arsenal could potentially play a back three of Monreal-Koscielny-Lichtsteiner on Sunday, if necessary.

Alternative options

Emery also has the option to play a back four, or move Sead Kolasinac or Mohamed Elneny to centre-back, as they’ve both played the position before.

The head coach can also look to the academy, with Zech Medley impressing on his senior debut against FC Vorskla. Daniel Ballard has also made a strong start to the season, and Ben Sheaf returned from injury on Sunday.

There are plenty of options, even if it’s not ideal to be missing all of the club’s first choice defenders in the position. We’ll see what Emery decides to do in the two matches this week.