After an injury-filled season, Mikel Arteta asks for larger squads in football to protect the players

Arsenal has suffered a lot this season due to injuries, and their bad luck doesn't stop there, as they have suffered serious blows the past weeks, with key players like Gabriel Magalhães missing out the rest of the season, as it happened with Kai Havertz and Gabriel Jesús these past months. For Mikel Arteta, the solution is to allow more players to be signed on the squad.

Current regulations only allow for 25 players to be registered in the squad when the season starts, with nine players being allowed to be on the bench during the actual games. But Arteta thinks that, with the increased number of matches being played in all competitions, it's reasonable to expect that the squad will be bigger.

This is what the Spanish coach said to Daily Mail: "Logically if we demand the players to play more games in more competitions with more travel and more intensity, the only solution to deal with it is more players. I don't see any other solution."

On the edge of the Champions League quarter-finals against Real Madrid, Arsenal will be without Havertz, Jesus, Magalhães, and Calafiori. On the other side, things don't look too good, as Carvajal, Ceballos, Mendy, and Militão will not side-lined for Real Madrid, with Thibaut Courtois barely recovering on time for Tuesday's match after missing the past three games.