Arsenal injury news: Arsene Wenger admits to 'pushing' Aaron Ramsey after latest hamstring injury

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James Benge15 August 2016

Arsene Wenger has admitted that he rushed back Aaron Ramsey – and the Arsenal midfielder could pay the price after sustaining another hamstring injury.

The Welsh international was the only one of Arsenal’s quartet of Euro 2016 semi-finalists to feature in Sunday’s 4-3 loss to Liverpool, where Mesut Ozil and French finalists Olivier Giroud and Laurent Koscielny were not even involved in the matchday squad.

Summer signing Granit Xhaka and Santi Cazorla, who missed out on selection for the Spanish squad, were both left on the bench despite having enjoyed longer breaks and played more minutes of pre-season football. The latter was to replace Ramsey on the hour, with Wenger later confirming that he was awaiting news from his medical team on the severity of the hamstring injury.

Discussing his decision to bench the £33.8million Xhaka Wenger told the club website: “Look, him and Ramsey [and others] - they all came back later.

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“I pushed Ramsey in and he got injured. It’s a very difficult situation to sort out because the players come back late because of the Euros and, on top of that, you play them and they get injured. If you don’t play them you miss them.”

Both Ramsey and Alexis Sanchez, who also struggled to impact the contest after a bright start, had been fast-tracked back to action and travelled with the club on their tour of Scandinavia. The pair both started a 3-2 friendly win over Manchester City most notable for the ankle injury suffered by centre-back Gabriel.

Ramsey’s hamstring injury is the fourth the midfielder has suffered in less than two years – the 25-year-old missed five crucial games at the end of last season when he limped off in an FA Cup replay over Hull days after Wenger had expressed his fear over the Wales international’s fitness.

To compound Wenger’s misery Alex Iwobi was also withdrawn through injury in the second half, potentially leaving Arsenal without five first-team players for Saturday’s trip to Leicester.

However Wenger still believes that his side can turn it around against the champions, the only side to finish above Arsenal last season.

“I’m very disappointed. We have to take it like that and prepare for the next game.

“I’m convinced that there’s a lot to come from this team and from this group and we have to recover from that blow and prepare for our next game.”

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