#squad-rotation

#squad-rotation

There were some doubts in the build-up to the game about whether Christian Pulisic would recover in time for the trip to the capital. He missed the league game against Lazio on Saturday night after complaining of muscle fatigue last week, so the staff didn't take any chances. After only doing part of Tuesday's session with the rest of the squad, the doubts continued regarding his presence for the 'rematch' in Rome. Now, some positive news has emerged from this morning's training at Milanello.

Now, according to SPORT, Fermin's physical problem originated in Barcelona's La Liga game against Athletic Club last weekend. It came specifically from Oihan Sancet's very harsh tackle, a play in which the Athletic midfielder caught Fermin on his leg, forcing him to remain on the ground for a long moment and showing clear signs of pain. Sancet was sent off for the challenge.

As such, he has played nine consecutive matches, completing the full 90 minutes in eight of them, and did not take part in group training on Friday. The accumulation of minutes is beginning to take its toll, and Flick may decide it's finally time to give the 25-year-old a breather. Another factor behind Kounde's recent dip in sharpness is Lamine Yamal's fitness issues.

We need to go to Europe because of everything. Our club needs to be in Europe, it's hard to have a very, very good squad. Imagine for me to have Kobbie Mainoo with that [many] minutes that he's playing, he needs more games for me to make a rotation because, with one game [a week], it's really hard.

Dortmund travel to Parken hoping to bounce back from their defeat to Bayern Munich in the Bundesliga at the weekend. Kovac's side are seventh in the 36-team league standings after collecting four points from their first two games, beating Athletic Bilbao 4-1 in their last European fixture. Dortmund have only lost one of their eight Champions League matches under Kovac (W4 D3), who replaced Nuri Sahin back in January.

Gyokeres has played 90 minutes in six of Arsenal's opening 10 matches - more than Arteta planned for, with the knee injury to Kai Havertz restricting the ability the manager has to rotate the 27-year-old. Havertz is one of Arteta's most trusted players and there is an argument to be had that the German would have started instead of Gyokeres in big away matches against Liverpool - the Gunners' only defeat of the season - Newcastle United and Manchester United, which they won.

Both managers made changes to their strongest teams, which was expected from a Sparta perspective ahead of Sunday's Prague derby but a little surprising from the Irish point of view considering Kerry are their FAI Cup opponents - Bradley said afterwards that the meeting with the First Division underdogs did influence his selection. Graham Burke is used to dropping out for away days in Europe to make room for Darragh Nugent, but Dylan Watts and Danny Mandroiu also joined him on the bench,

"Hattrick Harry is what they used to call me in school when I was younger."