Arsene Wenger believes that the Premier League has kicked off way too early and this has affected his main team as some players could not be added to his starting lineup of Arsenal’s opening match against Crystal Palace.
The German trio consisting of: Mesut Ozil, Per Mertesacker and Lukas Podolski have only just made their return to the training camps of Arsenal in England as they took an extended break following Germany’s 2014 World Cup triumph. None of them were featured in Arsenal’s match against Crystal Palace as they just could not make it in time to play along with some of their new teammates and had to miss out from training sessions of Arsenal.
The Italian league Serie A will start on August 30 while the other top tier league in Europe, the Spanish league initiates on August 23 which certainly does give the players and managers of those leagues more time to develop new formations and a short break from the 2014 World Cup.
Arsenal’s Arsene Wenger said: “We are a bit short in our preparation. We had 11 players at the World Cup. The final of the World Cup was on July 13; the start of the Premier League season is August 16. If you don’t give players enough holidays or enough build-up in their preparation and play them straight away, then they get injured’’.
An example of these rushed league schedules can be seen in the French league where the Brazilian Thiago Silva sustained an injury that will leave him out of action for a few weeks as the captain of PSG suffered a hamstring injury during a friendly encounter against Napoli just a few days before the French league kicked off.
The French manager of Arsenal says that players need time to readjust and play with their respective clubs which takes more than just a few days as well as needing to take a break as a way to avoid unnecessary injuries.
