Mikel Arteta confirms major new triple Arsenal boost for Man City showdown

Gunners squad significantly strengthened for Community Shield clash

Mikel Arteta has confirmed that Declan Rice and Bukayo Saka are both set to make their Arsenal returns against Manchester City in the Community Shield.

Both players are now back in training following their respective breaks in the aftermath of England’s run to the World Cup semi-finals in North America and are in contention to feature in Sunday’s annual season curtain-raiser in Cardiff between the Premier League champions and FA Cup holders.

The same is also true of Rice’s fellow midfielder Martin Zubimendi, who was part of the Spain squad that won the tournament last month and is also now back with Arsenal.

“They will be available,” Arsenal boss Arteta said of Rice, Saka and Zubimendi at his pre-City press conference on Friday.

“They trained with us today, they will train tomorrow. If they are in the condition we expect them to be, they will be involved.”

Saka was originally supposed to report back for Arsenal duty on Monday, though both he and Spain goalkeeper David Raya returned earlier than anticipated on Saturday.

Eberechi Eze, Noni Madueke and Mikel Merino have also returned from their post-World Cup holidays and all played in Wednesday’s pre-season friendly draw against Como, along with Raya, though Arsenal are without William Saliba for an extended period due to a long-term back issue that does not need surgery but was exacerbated during the World Cup.

Saka managed an Achilles injury for much of the second half of last season, while Rice revealed during the World Cup how much he had been impacted by neural pain in his hamstring since Christmas before also dealing with a calf complaint and bout of illness.

However, Arteta is confident that a few weeks off has been especially beneficial for the pair and they will not be hampered by those issues heading into the new campaign.

“We haven’t noticed anything,” Arteta said. “They have individual plans. Through the time they had with the national team they’ve been trying to evolve those issues and they have improved.

“In the rest period that they had, they both had specific programmes for themselves. They’ve been doing those and so far what I saw the last two or three days, it was really good.”

Arsenal are also missing Jurrien Timber against City, with the versatile right-back having yet to recover from a persistent groin injury that has hampered him since March.

Arteta admitted earlier this week that the Dutch international - who missed the World Cup entirely after making only a brief return off the bench in the Champions League final in May - was still “weeks away” from a return to action, a timeframe that appears to remain unchanged despite a more positive update.

“[He is] progressing really well,” Arteta said when asked for the latest on Timber before the showdown with a City side now coached by former Chelsea boss Enzo Maresca. “He’s on the pitch, we're ramping up now certain actions, especially the volume and the load.

Asked whether Timber could return before the international break next month, Arteta added: “I don’t know. We have to wait and see.

“He needs to start to train with the group in the next week or so hopefully and then see how he progresses from there.

“But obviously it’s been a long-term issue and we want to make sure that every step that we take is the right one. He’s such an important player for us.”