Arteta gives positive injury updates on three Arsenal stars and reveals their big transfer ambition

Mikel Arteta revealed that Declan Rice, Bukayo Saka and Martin Zubimendi will be available for the Community Shield final.

The trio have now arrived back in Arsenal training following an extended holiday after reaching the final stages of the World Cup last month.

Despite not taking part in pre-season so far, Arteta was asked whether they are likely to feature on Sunday.

“They [Rice, Saka and Zubimendi] will be available,” he answered. “They trained with us today. They will train tomorrow and if they are in a condition we expect them to be, they will be involved.”

Arteta also gave updates on Timber, who missed the World Cup with a groin injury and William Saliba, who suffered a back injury at the World Cup for France.

“Jurrien [Timber] is progressing really well,” he said. “He is on the pitch, we are ramping up now, the volume and the load. I think he is in a good trajectory but there is still a few weeks to go.”

“William [Saliba] as we know, is a more long-term injury.”

“I don’t know, we will have to see. He needs to start to train with the group in the next week or so, hopefully. See how he progresses from there.” Arteta added about Timber.

“It has been a long-term issue, and right now we want to make sure every step we take is the right one. He feels right to do that. He is such an important player for us.”

With over two weeks to go in the transfer window, Arsenal have already signed Christos Tzolis and Bruno Guimaraes. Arteta was asked if they have further plans in the rest of the window.

“It’s a very exciting part of the season as well. When a lot of things happen, it creates excitement; there is an opportunity as well to evolve,” he explained.

“There is a good way to understand what every player is feeling and we are trying to do our maximum to end up in the next 13-14 days in the best possible condition to compete in every possible competition.

“It is always the case, there is an opportunity to go both ways [players out and in]. We have to see how the market responds and what as a club, we can do.

“You know I am not going to talk about an individual, but what I can obviously tell you is the ambition of the club. It is big that we want to improve the squad,” Arteta added.

“We want to evolve the squad to achieve. We have detected some areas that can be a strength in what we are trying to do.”