Girouds Omission From Champions League, Another Arsenal Gaffe

Arsenal have been involved in several gaffe in the past especially one that involves how a player’s injury was managed. The recent injury to Mesut Ozil was a case in point. The German playmaker was ruled out by its national team medical staff for a period of three months in October. But Arsene Wenger was quick to downplay the injury as he has always sought to do, thereby raising the hopes of fans. He claimed in mid October that Ozil would spend just six weeks out, but as it turned out the initial prognosis of the German team was spot on. He is not expected back until the New Year.

This lack of certainty in which club has developed a knack for not being sure when a player would return from injury could easily be linked to the reason why Oliver Giroud was not registered for the group stages of the Champions League.

The club has taken some flak in recent days for the defeat the team has suffered in the last few weeks, as well as the indifferent form since the season started, but the club could be taken to task as to why Oliver Giroud was not registered in the first place for the group stages. The time scale put for his recovery was three months, and it was thought at the time that he would return to the team’s set up in the New Year. Could the team have taken a gamble in registering him after all in view of the fact that there was a place left to be filled in the UEFA quota?

Assuming it was a match (Borussia Dortmund) that no other striker was fit; it would have been a costly mistake on the part of the club that he was not registered.

Another thing to consider is whether the club got the time frame of Giroud’s recovery wrong? Arsene Wenger claimed in his press conference last week, that the French striker was one month ahead of schedule. Could it have been possible for the club to set the time he eventually spent on the side-lined correctly? Which turned out to be two and half months?

If the history of the club’s past history of getting the recovery time of player’s wrong is anything to go by, then the answer to the above question is that they could have been able to do more to get the actual time frame Oliver Giroud would use to recover from his fractured bone.

It is a situation that beats the club hollow as it inability to be exact when it comes to player’s recovery could have come back to bite the club if other options were not available for the club to use.

Oliver Giroud showed what he was capable of within the short time he was on the field against Manchester United. His first contribution was getting on the end of a corner kick that almost resulted in a goal, while he eventually scored a goal deep into added time.

The club has a collective responsibility to get the actual time of a player’s recovery right. It has affected Arsenal’s season in the past, where two-three weeks layoff became three months.

Oliver Giroud will not play a part against Borussia Dortmund and Galatasaray. While Wenger claimed he returned from injury one month of ahead of schedule, there is no doubt that the club could have done more to get this right in the first place, which could have forestall his non participation in the group stages of the Champions League.