Mikel Arteta admits Arsenal player’s still not been in training yet

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Mikel Arteta has told Arsenal’s official website that Gabriel may miss the opening day of the season.

Missing out

Arsenal are set to take on Brentford in the Premier League’s curtain raiser in under two weeks’ time now.

However, it may be that Gabriel is not fit enough to feature for the Gunners.

Gabriel picked up an injury at the Olympics, which has kept him out even now.

The Brazilian has still not returned to Arsenal training, which means that he is now running out of time to return for the first game of the campaign.

“We don’t know [whether he will be available for Brentford],” he said.

“He’s still injured. He picked up and injury while he was doing the preparation for the Olympics with Brazil and at the moment he’s not been able to train with us. That seems unlikely at the moment but hopefully he can recover quickly.”

Holding in?

If Gabriel is to be ruled out with injury then it could be a major blow for Arsenal.

Arteta may well have wanted to try out his new centre-back pairing of Ben White and Gabriel against Brentford for the first time, but it seems that his options could now be limited.

If Gabriel is ruled out then Rob Holding appears the most likely contender to start in Arsenal’s back-line.

Arsenal will be under pressure to get their season off to a positive start against newly promoted Brentford, after the Gunners failed to impress last term.