Senegal boss Pape Thiaw has eased concerns over Pape Matar Sarr after the midfielder picked up an injury against Brazil, offering Tottenham a major lift ahead of next week\u2019s North London Derby. Sarr began Saturday\u2019s 2-0 loss at the Emirates but was withdrawn in the second half after a heavy challenge. He was helped off by medical staff and looked uncomfortable, adding to worries for Thomas Frank, who already has 12 senior players out injured.<\/p>\n
Thiaw later played down the issue, saying: \u201cHe took a knock and didn\u2019t feel right, so he came off as a precaution, but I don\u2019t think it\u2019s anything serious.\u201d<\/p>\n
Arsenal, meanwhile, were handed a scare of their own when Gabriel limped out of Brazil\u2019s friendly. The 27-year-old defender went down around the hour mark with a thigh issue and was replaced after treatment. When Carlo Ancelotti was asked about the severity and whether Arsenal fans could relax, he admitted he couldn\u2019t reassure them:<\/p>\n
\u201cIs it bad? I don\u2019t know. It\u2019s an adductor problem. The medical team will check tomorrow. We\u2019re disappointed \u2014 you never want players to get injured.\u201d<\/p>\n
Gabriel\u2019s absence would be a significant setback for the league leaders, who have built their strong start on a defence that has conceded just five goals in 11 Premier League matches. The centre-back had looked sharp before the injury, making crucial interventions, and he previously missed the end of last season with a hamstring issue that kept him out of the Champions League run-in.<\/p>\n
Should Gabriel be unavailable, it would be a major boost for Frank, who has begun well in north London but is still trying to fine-tune Spurs\u2019 attacking setup.<\/p>\n
After last weekend\u2019s 2-2 draw with Manchester United, Frank said they are still working on finding the right mix up front: \u201cThere were some positive moments in attack. We\u2019re always trying to improve the connections and find the perfect blend, and I think we saw some small steps forward.\u201d<\/p>\n
He explained their approach: \u201cAgainst United, we wanted Kolo Muani and Richarlison as a front two to attack crosses, an area we felt could hurt them. It worked well for the first big chance Richarlison had from Brennan Johnson\u2019s cross. That was a key part of our plan, and we need different profiles for different matches.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Senegal boss Pape Thiaw has eased concerns over Pape Matar Sarr after the midfielder picked up an injury against Brazil, offering Tottenham a major lift ahead of next week\u2019s North London Derby. Sarr began Saturday\u2019s 2-0 loss at the Emirates but was withdrawn in the second half after a heavy challenge. He was helped off …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":54587,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-54629","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/eplbanter.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/0_JS387910998.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eplbanter.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54629","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eplbanter.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eplbanter.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eplbanter.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eplbanter.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=54629"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/eplbanter.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54629\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":54630,"href":"https:\/\/eplbanter.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54629\/revisions\/54630"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eplbanter.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/54587"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eplbanter.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=54629"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eplbanter.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=54629"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eplbanter.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=54629"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}