20 January 2024 , 15:35
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Mikel Arteta says he hopes Declan Rice's injury isn't "too serious" after the Arsenal midfielder limped off with a suspected hamstring issue during their 5-0 thrashing of Crystal Palace.
Rice, the Gunners £105million summer signing, appeared to mouth "hammy" to a team-mate when he was replaced by fellow midfielder Jorginho in the 73rd minute with Arsenal leading 3-0. A late double from Gabriel Martinelli made it five and post-match, Arteta gave an update on his injured star as well as goalscoring centre-back Gabriel Magalhaes, who also made way early.
"Declan was feeling something in his hamstring," the Gunners boss confirmed. "So we didn't want to take any risks with the score at 3-0. Gabby was coming off a tackle I think on his knee and he was struggling a little bit. I hope it's nothing too serious."
Rice and Gabriel's injuries were only negatives on a terrific day for Arsenal, who ended a barren run of no wins in four games by beating under-fire Roy Hodgson's Palace. Brazilian Gabriel got the scoring underway on 11 minutes before Eagles goalkeeper Dean Henderson's own goal made it two before half-time.
Leandro Trossard put the game out of sight for Arsenal before Martinelli grabbed both his goals in added time. Arteta beamed to TNT Sports in reaction to the victory: "The positivity we had right from the beginning. I had a really good feeling in the last 10 days about the team and how they reacted. They are great players, we have a great team and today they really wanted it. I could feel that.
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"It was a win with a clean sheet and we scored five goals which we really needed. We opened the game up the way we did [with the early goal] which is really helpful as it means the opponent has to be more aggressive which allows more spaces. We exploited that really well."
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Declan Rice had to be substituted as Arsenal thrashed Crystal Palace 5-0 (Shaun Botterill/Getty Images)Bukayo Saka, who went without a goal or assist in the match, but created a game-high four chances, added: "It's really important. First thing was to win today but that early goal helped. It calmed us and we could control the game more. I thought Gabriel Martinelli was going to get a hat-trick at one point.
"Dubai was really nice for us to have that break. We weren't in the best form before that and it helped us refresh and work on the things we needed to. We all knew we could score goals. We believe in ourselves and you saw that today because we scored five and we're happy with our performance. I needed the [rest] to be honest. It was nice."