Arsenal loanee William Saliba has suffered a fresh injury setback as Saint-Etienne boss Claude Puel has confirmed he’s sustained a broken foot.
As noted by BBC Sport, the Gunners secured the signing of the talented 18-year-old for £27m this past summer before sending him back to Saint-Etienne on loan this season to continue to gain experience and develop his game with playing time.
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Unfortunately for the north London giants and the player himself, that hasn’t exactly gone to plan as after missing eight games due to a hamstring injury, which in turn has already limited him to just seven appearances so far this season across all competitions, Saliba is set for another spell on the sidelines.
As confirmed by the club’s official site, Saint-Etienne note that the defensive ace suffered a break in his fifth metatarsal during the clash with Monaco at the weekend, and so is unsurprisingly set to miss out in the Europa League in midweek.
However, there is no timeline put on his recovery as of yet and so it remains to be seen just how long this latest blow will keep him out of action, but given the nature of the injury, a broken bone in the foot isn’t something that will heal immediately.
It’s a nightmare scenario for Arsenal as ultimately they would have hoped that Saliba would benefit from another year in France to join up with the Gunners next summer and be better prepared to play a key role for Unai Emery’s side.
Having conceded 15 goals in their opening 11 Premier League games this season, giving them the second worst defensive record of the top 10 sides, it’s clear that Arsenal still need to address that area of their squad.
However, Saliba is seemingly set to spend the majority of the first half of the campaign recovering from injuries, and so it now remains to be seen how long he will need to get back from the latest setback and whether or not he can get a run of games under his belt next year to ensure that he will have gained something from his loan spell.
