LONDON :Injury lay-offs are rarely welcomed by players but Arsenal winger Bukayo Saka believes his enforced break could benefit him and his club as they prepare to face holders Real Madrid in the quarter-finals of the Champions League on Tuesday.
Saka has emerged as arguably the most irreplaceable player in Mikel Arteta’s squad and while his return from a serious hamstring injury has probably come too late to salvage Arsenal’s Premier League title hopes, European glory is a realistic aim.
“I think mentally it was really good for me,” the 23-year-old Saka, who missed more than three months after sustaining an injury before Christmas, said on Monday.
“Obviously it was really tough for me initially to find out the extent of my injury, that I was going to have surgery, it was really tough for me to hear the news at first but once it was done and successful I was just focused on coming back stronger and I had a lot of time.”
Saka missed England’s opening two World Cup qualifiers last month but scored on his return for Arsenal in the Premier League win against Fulham last week.
If Arsenal are to stun Real Madrid, they will need Saka firing on all cylinders and he believes his relative freshness will give him an edge against the Spanish giants.
“The past five years I’ve been playing game after game so it was the first proper break I’ve had,” he said. “It was really good for me. I got to do a lot of things that I don’t normally do. It’s really nice to be back and I feel fresh mentally.
“I’m just focused now on the positives and I couldn’t ask to come back at a better time of the season than now.”
Saka’s importance to Arsenal is underlined by his statistics this season – 10 goals and 14 assists in 26 matches in all competitions, including four goals in the Champions League.
Arsenal were stopped at the quarter-final stage last year by Bayern Munich when they were still neck and neck with Manchester City in the battle for the Premier League title.
This time, all their eggs are in their European basket and Saka says Tuesday’s first leg could be one of the best occasions ever witnessed at the Emirates Stadium.
“It’s a very big night and the stakes are high against one of the best teams in the competition,” he said.
“It’s the first time the club has been in back-to-back Champions League quarter-finals for a while, so tomorrow night we want to take the next step and try and get over the line.”
