Match Day 2, Arsenal Injury Questions
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Today sees the start of Match Day 2 in the UEFA Champions League. Arsenal travel to Bucharest where they will face Steaua Bucharest. Alexander Hleb will travel with the team but his chances of playing are still up in the air after he had a rather nasty encounter with West Ham's Mark Noble over the weekend. Also in question for Arsenal are Emmanuel Adebayor with a thigh injury, Abou Diaby with an ankle problem and Mathieu Flamini with a sore groin. Some players have already been ruled out against the Romanians, Jens Lehmann (elbow), William Gallas (groin), Tomas Rosicky (hamstring), Eduardo (groin) and Alexandre Song (calf) all remain sidelined.
So the travelling squad looks like this for the Gunners; Manuel Almunia, Bacary Sagna, Kolo Toure, Philippe Senderos, Gael Clichy, Emmanuel Eboue, Francesc Fabregas, Mathieu Flamini, Abou Diaby, Emmanuel Adebayor, Robin van Persie, Lukasz Fabianski, Alexander Hleb, Denilson, Gilberto, Theo Walcott, Nicklas Bendtner, and Armand Traore.
This will be the very first time that Steaua Bucharest and Arsenal have ever played each other. The Romanians have played English opposition 10 times in the past. Bucharest are undefeated on Romanian soil but have yet to win in England. Arsenal's only other previous trip to Romania came in the 1969-70 Inter-Cities Fairs Cup, when they destroyed Dinamo Bacau 9-1 on aggregate. Arsenal went on that season to win the Fairs Cup, hopefully a good result in Romania this time around will result in a similar outcome.
Looking at current form Bucharest lost their openning UCL match against Czech side Slavia Prague while Arsenal won their first match versus Sevilla. Following that defeat to Slavia Prague Bucharest manager Gheorghe Hagi resigned, and was replaced by Italy's Massimo Pedrazzini, who has no CL experience at all. On Saturday, Steaua beat FC Vaslui 1-0 in the Romanian league, and are sixth in the table; Arsenal won 1-0 win at West Ham to stay top of the Premier League and unbeaten in all competitions this season (10 wins, one draw).
