Arsenal 0 Sporting 0: Gunners reach Europa League last-32 but game marred by Danny Welbeck horror injury

ARSENAL reached the Europa League last-32 but Danny Welbeck hopes for the rest of the season hang in the balance after he suffered a horrific ankle injury.

The England striker was carried off in the 26th minute with his right leg encased in a rigid boot and an oxygen mask to ease the pain of the suspected fracture.

Only hours earlier Welbeck had been named in Gareth Southgate’s squad for next week’s Wembley internationals against the USA and Croatia.

But now a player who has already lost almost a year-and-a-half of his career to a serious knee injury is facing another prolonged spell on the sidelines.

And with his contract due to expire at the end of this season, Gunners fans were left wondering whether they will see 27-year-old Welbeck in an Arsenal shirt again.

The former Manchester United star sustained the trauma when he threw himself at Stephan Lichtsteiner’s cross and landed heavily on his right ankle before collapsing to the ground in agony.

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It was clearly a serious injury and the shocked look on Matteo Guendouzi’s face as he watched the medics treating his stricken team-mate told the full horrific story.

The pictures were so gruesome that BT Sport did not screen a replay of the incident as Welbeck immediately signalled his distress to the Arsenal bench.

The injury totally overshadowed last night’s match as Arsenal secured their place in the last 32 of the Europa League.

And it suddenly leaves Unai Emery short of attacking options for the crucial Christmas period.

Emery had insisted that he would be treating Sporting with the utmost respect because he wanted to get qualification wrapped up as quickly as possible.

Yet that didn’t prevent him from making nine changes to the team which had performed so impressively against Liverpool at the weekend.

Only Rob Holding and Henrikh Mkhitaryan survived the manager’s rotation, although he still included eight full internationals in his starting line-up.

Sporting arrived in London under the supervision of interim manager Tiago Fernandes, who had been promoted from youth coach following the sacking of Jose Peseiro last week.

Having already dismissed Jorge Jesus in the summer, it means the Portuguese strugglers have had more managers in the past five months than Arsenal have had in the previous 22 years.

Yet that didn’t dampen the spirit of their sizeable travelling contingent, who were clearly determined to enjoy their day out in London.

INTERACTIVE STATS – CLICK on the categories to find out how the teams fared 

The Arsenal fans are not quite so enthusiastic about the Europa League and the large number of empty seats suggested that many still consider this competition to be beneath them.

But Emery does not share their antipathy after winning the Europa League three times in a row with Seville and was as animated as ever with his touchline instructions.

As usual, it took Arsenal a while to get into their stride and it was a good 15 minutes before they remotely threatened their opponents’ goal.

Carl Jenkinson and Emile Smith Rowe both tried their luck from distance without troubling keeper Renan Ribeiro and Welbeck was only inches away from getting on the end of Mkhitaryan’s inviting cross.

But their first serious attempt came courtesy of Sporting defender Jeremy Mathieu, whose attempts to clear Guendouzi’s 18th minute cross was heading towards his own goal until Sebastian Coates cleared off the line.

Welbeck glanced wide from Mkhitaryan’s another cross but that was to be the luckless striker’s final contribution before his injury jinx struck again.

That meant an earlier than planned appearance for Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang and Arsenal’s £60million record signing almost broke the deadlock when he volleyed Mkhitaryan’s 46th minute cross against the bar.

Alex Iwobi teed up Aubameyang for another first-time effort into the side-netting but Sporting were proving to be an unexpectedly tough nut to crack.

The visitors were not averse to slowing the game down with a series of tactical fouls aimed at disrupting Arsenal’s flow.

And there was further bad news for Arsenal when veteran full-back Lichtsteiner pulled up with a 72nd minute hamstring injury and limped off to be replaced by Ainsley Maitland-Niles.