Mikel Arteta provides important William Saliba injury update amid ‘unsatisfied’ Champions League statement

William Saliba is expected to miss the rest of the season through injury with Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta confirming the Frenchman won’t play against Chelsea on Tuesday night.

The 22-year-old has been absent from the Arsenal squad since sustaining a back injury in the Europa League loss to Sporting last month.

There was initial optimism that Saliba could be available for the 4-1 defeat to Manchester City at the Etihad, but the seriousness of his injury means he wasn’t risked.

As revealed in a recent episode of the Chris Wheatley Show, is is expected that Saliba will miss the rest of the campaign through injury.

“It’s pretty similar, he’s not going to be involved tomorrow and we will have to wait until the next game to see where we are,” said Arteta.

“He hasn’t improved this week at all.”

Meanwhile, Arteta has praised the mentality of his players for not being satisfied with Champions League qualification in the wake of the defeat to Manchester City.

The Gunners could leapfrog City with a win against Chelsea but Pep Guardiola’s side still have a game in hand on their title rivals.

“Win tomorrow - that’s what we have to do,” said Arteta.

“Within the disappointment and the spirit around [the club], we need to do two things - recognise what a lot of people around the club have done to get us back into the Champions League, which was already a difficult thing to achieve. Not a lot of people were very optimistic that we had the ability to do that at the start of the season, and we need to start recognising the good work that a lot of people have done to achieve that.

“The second thing - which I like the most - is that even achieving that with six games to go - something that hasn’t happened in more than a decade at this club - that we are still not satisfied, still upset and we want more. We want the club to be consistently with the best, that’s the mentality we need and that’s what I’ve loved most over the last few days.”