Frustrated Walcott determined to make up for lost time

CHAMPIONS LEAGUE:THE 90 minutes were almost up in the group game at Olympiakos when the home team's midfielder Leonardo lunged recklessly at Theo Walcott. The Arsenal winger crumpled and clutched his right foot as he underwent treatment, and it was easy to fear the worst.

It has, after all, been a nightmare season for the 20-year-old. A combination of back, knee and hamstring injuries had restricted him before the trip to Athens to only 149 minutes of competitive football. He had not completed a full 90 minutes since his involvement for the England under-21s in the European Championship final against Germany on June 29th, and he appeared set for another early departure.

Walcott, though, returned to see out the last moments of Arsenal’s 1-0 defeat. Arsene Wenger, the manager, could have been excused if he had exercised caution and substituted him. Yet Walcott was determined to make a statement over and above his lively performance. The last thing that he wants is to be considered injury prone.

“I am fine,” Walcott insisted afterwards. “It just needs a bit of ice. I took a whack and the boots are so thin these days that you feel them. I stayed down a little bit because it was quite painful but I’ll be fine for the weekend.”

Was it not an idea to have a scan, if only as a precaution?

“I am not the sort of person who goes for scans,” he replied. “I rely on feelings.”

The game at the weekend is the one Walcott looks for at the start of every season. Liverpool were the team he supported as a boy and he has come to consider Anfield as his favourite away ground.

It was there he announced his talent to a global audience in April 2008, when he blazed away from four Liverpool players to set up the goal for Emmanuel Adebayor that looked as though it would decide the Champions League quarter-final second leg.

Two late Liverpool goals put paid to that notion but Walcott generally rises to the occasion at Anfield, and he would hate to miss Sunday’s Premier League fixture. He feels it can spark his season and reignite Arsenal’s title bid.

“Hopefully, if I get a start, I will play my heart out,” he said. “I was a Liverpool fan when I was younger and I have always played very well there. There are a few teams involved in the title race and we are definitely one of them. We are strong candidates. It was good for me to get a start against Olympiakos and blow the cobwebs away. It had been a long time since I had 90 minutes and the main thing was to battle through and be all right for the weekend.”

After being granted extended summer leave by Wenger following his exertions for Fabio Capello’s England team and then Stuart Pearce’s under-21s, Walcott over-stretched to pull fibres in his lower back against Valencia, in his only pre-season appearance.

His recovery was complicated and he did not return until October and, in his second game back, damaged knee ligaments in a challenge from Birmingham City’s Liam Ridgewell and was ruled out for another month. Then, against Chelsea the weekend before last, he felt a hamstring.

“The funny thing is that the injuries are no fault of my own,” said Walcott. “It has been very bad luck this season. I am not an injury-prone player. Lately people may have thought I have been injury prone but I just need games and the more I play, the better I’ll get.”

Wenger, who has given the 20-year-old forward Carlos Vela a new long-term contract, has selection problems for Anfield. He does not foresee Nicklas Bendtner coming back until the new year and has added Emmanuel Eboue to an injury list that already contains Robin van Persie, Tomas Rosicky, Gael Clichy, Kieran Gibbs and Johan Djourou.

Abou Diaby and Eduardo da Silva might return but Wenger bemoaned “knocks and bruises” to Cesc Fabregas, William Gallas, Armand Traore and Andrey Arshavin. They are expected to recover. The bonus for the manager is Walcott’s desire to make up for lost time.

- Guardian Service