'Give us another day!': Mikel Arteta makes fixture plea as Arsenal injuries mount

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Evening Standard

·3 December 2025

'Give us another day!': Mikel Arteta makes fixture plea as Arsenal injuries mount

The Gunners have a 63-hour break before facing Aston Villa on Saturday lunchtime

Mikel Arteta says it is “common sense” to suggest the footballing calendar has become too congested.

The Arsenal boss oversaw a 2-0 win over Brentford on Wednesday night, three days after a battling draw at Chelsea and three days before a trip to third-placed Aston Villa.

The result re-established his team’s five-point lead at the top of the Premier League, but came with a price as Cristhian Mosquera and Declan Rice forced off with fitness issues.

Mosquera came off in the 43rd minute, having landed awkwardly after contesting for a header with Kevin Schade. Rice was taken off seven minutes from time after receiving treatment on his calf.

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The Gunners have had to contend with several injuries this season, with William Saliba, Gabriel, Kai Havertz and Leandro Trossard all unavailable against Brentford.

The Gunners play seven further games in December, with the next a trip to Birmingham for a 12.30pm kick-off on Saturday, which comes 63 hours after the full-time whistle blew on Wednesday. And Arteta says the demand on players has become too much.

“Probably it's not one thing, but we can help the players and everybody, the league and everybody to do what we have to do,” Arteta said in his post-match press conference.

“Give us another day, and especially the teams that are playing so much in Europe, to everybody in general, I think we can do that because we're all going to benefit from that.

“We've never had such a schedule at every level, not only in the Premier League but every competition internationally as well so we need to try to do that.

Arteta has consistently called for players to be given more rest amid an increasing fixture schedule, and asked whether he felt his argument was not being listened to, Arteta interjected to say players are not machines.

“It's not an argument, I think it's common sense,” the Arsenal boss continued. “I think it's not at some point this becomes too much and the players are not machines but we have to try to do that when we can.”

Brentford also named a rotated side for their trip to the Emirates.

Andrews made five changes to the team that beat Burnley 3-1 last weekend, with Igor Thiago, Mikkel Damsgaard, Nathan Collins and Jordan Henderson all dropping to the bench, and the Brentford boss said his decision was in part due to the knocks his team had suffered over the weekend.

“A bit of everything (contributed to the team selection),” Andrews said. “A couple of knocks, a couple of bits of players maybe needed a little bit of a rest, and not to start more so to come on. Utilising the squad, which I have so much confidence in.

“Picking the team on a weekly basis is difficult at times because the players do push each other. I felt a lot of the players that came in tonight absolutely deserved to start the game.”