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Arsenal and Sunderland are both expected to be without at least three players through injury for their Premier League clash at Emirates Stadium. Fitness concerns for Mikel Arteta looked to have eased in recent weeks, but three key players have since picked up varying issues.

Their Saturday opponents also had to contend with a number of players being unavailable in January and some of those have continued into this month. Perhaps the biggest of those is the absence of captain Granit Xhaka with an ankle injury.

He has thus far missed two Premier League games and is expected to miss at least the next three, including the trip to his former club after Regis Le Bris' update.

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In late January, he said: “Granit is doing well. He will have another assessment in one week, so from there we will see where he is and define the next steps. It will probably be about three more weeks."

The Sunderland boss didn't have an update ahead of the Arsenal match, but revealed he has been having a strong presence around the team.

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Xhaka was a huge favourite of Arteta during his spell in north London, with the Switzerland international key in helping Arsenal become title challengers.

Arsenal initially struggled to replace his goals from midfield following his transfer to Bayer Leverkusen. However, a combination of Declan Rice and Mikel Merino have been able to contribute. The latter will not be able to do that for the next few months however, as he has undergone surgery on a foot issue.

Martin Odegaard is another midfielder that Arteta has been unable to call on recently, but he admitted during a Friday press conference that his absence will be "a matter of days". Bukayo Saka is expected to miss a little bit longer than that even with Arteta issuing a positive update.

He said: "His hip is getting much better. So yeah, hopefully, very soon he will be with us."

The north London Derby away to Tottenham later this month is being earmarked as his potential return game with that timeline seeing him miss Sunderland and Brentford in the Premier League alongside an FA Cup fourth round tie against Wigan.

Max Dowman is another Gunners academy graduate currently out of action and that has been the case since early December. However, he is a "few weeks away" from returning to the fold, according to Arteta.

While Xhaka is the big miss for Sunderland, there are three others also dealing with injuries. New January signing Jocelin Ta Bi, who joined from Israeli outfit Maccabi Netanya, is yet to make his debut and that will not take place against Arsenal

On when he is expected to feature, Le Bris said: "We'll need approximately, I would say, 2-3 weeks to be game fit, so we'll take time to rebuild his fitness level as well, so it's a good opportunity for us to help him connect with the squad. He should be training with us in around ten days. I don't want to set a limit."

The Black Cats were heavily impacted by AFCON with numerous key players away for several weeks in Morocco. Reinildo Mandava, Noah Sadiki, Habib Diarra and Chemsdine Talbi have since returned and all contributed, but one star has not.

Back in mid-January, Le Bris confirmed that Betrand Traore returned to the Stadium of Light injured. He stated at the time that Traore would miss three-to-four weeks, and with that timeline on the horizon, he could be back soon but is still expected to miss out against Arsenal.