He does need to change a little but he is 100% committed all the time and it was a sick challenge. To avoid getting kicked again and again is one thing but to have someone slide into you with studs up, you can't do anything about that. It's incredible we didn't even get a free kick.

Wilshere is now a non factor this season. The earliest he will be able to play again is mid March. He just won't be able to get to speed.

With Arteta also facing a spell on the sidelines, we are looking short in midfield.

Rohit wrote:

... to have someone slide into you with studs up, you can't do anything about that. It's incredible we didn't even get a free kick.
...

Stuff like this makes my blood boil when i see the same ref in the same game blowing up and dishing out cheap yellow cards for innocuous challenges.

How is this self inflicted? He didn't stamp himself.

Is the left ankle the bad ankle?

I could have worded it better, but what I meant is that obviously his body is not capable of taking knocks, hard tackles, etc. easily, thus imho he must avoid such lunges like in the photo and be very cautious about 50-50ies. Yes, avoiding 50-50 challenges sucks for a midfielder, but it's still better than being endlessly injured.

Klaus wrote:

Is the left ankle the bad ankle?

No, the other one.

Is that a good thing or are they now both bad ankles?

This is how the best ever player learnt to deal with these type of tackles/fouls/lower extremity assaults.
This way he got to remain on the pitch rather than be carried off on a stretcher and lose 6 months rehabbing from injury.

His game is always stretching to get to passes, stretching to pass the ball. It's his style and not sure if he could really avoid that if that's his most natural.

The amount of injuries he is having now (big ones) is ridiculous. It's worse than Gibbs and almost Diaby level.

It's cos he has tiny little legs innet....

Its cos he plays for Arsene Wenger and his utterly inept staff.

We can blame Wenger for a lot, and we do, but for being responsible for Wilshere's injuries?!

The first injury that kept him out for a season, certainly. You only got yourself to blame when you keep playing him despite knowing he's been in the red since february.

The most recent one not so much though.

Jack is going to be perennially frustrating isn't he? sigh

FFS. According to the Daily Mail he's been out for 40% of his first team career so far. Missed 119 weeks and played only 95 times in 5 years.

WILSHERE'S WOE - A TIMELINE OF THE MIDFIELDER'S INJURIES

October 24 2009 - Ankle - until Dec 2 (5 1/2 weeks)

Jan 8 2010 - Hamstring - until Feb 9 (4 1/2 weeks)

November 14 2010 - Back - until Nov 23 (1 1/2 weeks)

August 1 2011 - Ankle - until Oct 27 2012 (65 weeks)

February 9 2013 - Hip - until Feb 16 (1 week - missed 0 games)

March 3 2013 - Ankle - until April 13 (4 1/2 weeks)

May 20 2013 - Ankle surgery - until July 4 (6 1/2 weeks)

October 31 2013 - Ankle - until November 10 (1 1/2 weeks)

Jan 24 2014 - Ankle - until Feb 8 (2 weeks)

March 5 2014 - Ankle - until May 11 (9 weeks)

October 26 2014 - Ankle/ilness - until Nov 9 (2 weeks)

November 22 2014 - Ankle - Up to four months (16 weeks)

Total: 119 weeks injured

When Wenger leaves the easiest solution would be to just fire everyone and rebuild the entire structure. Make sure to get the root of the problem, wherever it lies. It begs belief that we've thrown so much money at sorting out our injury situation and yet we've only managed to make it worse.

The one thing he's not done is have a deep enough squad and rotate sensibly though

Have a horrible feeling this is one too many. I wasn't that concerned about how well he was playing, but he needed to get a full season under his belt. He was looking sharper than he has been for 2 years and it might be a few steps back again now.

Never been one to moan about him inviting challenges because that's the whole point of his game and it's a quality one when he can move freely. But that role of sitting deep and spraying passes around might be forced now if his weak ankles keep troubling him, so I guess all those Xavi/Pirlo videos on his ipad will get good mileage. He's pretty good at it as he is showing for England but he was potentially uniquely world class with the quick feet, dropping the shoulder and running into space. Gut feeling is he's not going to be one of the best players in the world relying mainly passing range. Obviously he can occupy the same positions so we're not talking about him learning how to play a new position and he's always going to be too good for Aston Villa, but I reckon it's sufficiently different to put him off track.

This season's injury record is disturbingly bad even for us. What the fuck's going on.

The impact looked to be above his ankle. Think he'll be fine. Needs to avoid putting anymore weight on though