Due to a hamstring injury, Wolverhampton Wanderers forward Hwang Hee-chan will not be playing in his team’s trip to Newcastle United on Saturday.
In Wolves’ FA Cup fifth-round victory over Brighton & Hove Albion on Wednesday, Hwang, 28, suffered the injury. He was replaced in the second half of the match.
After the 1-0 victory, Wolves’ head coach Gary O’Neil declared that he would be “amazed” if Hwang was well enough to play against Newcastle.
O’Neil said on Friday that Hee Chan would not be able to attend the weekend. “He’s been ruled out for the time being, but there will be more evaluations following the weekend.
It’s disappointing because I was aware that a few players might not be ready for the cup midweek match. Before, Channy was feeling great; all of his recuperation had vanished.
He was someone we thought could go back, but such things do happen.
Hwang, who has 10 goals in 22 Premier League games, leads Wolves in scoring this season. The only games he had previously skipped were those he was playing in the Asian Cup with South Korea, missing four games in January and February.
While Matheus Cunha, a fellow attacker, is still sidelined after suffering a hamstring injury against Brentford last month, O’Neil did report that midfielder Joao Gomes is “feeling fine” following his departure against Brighton due to hamstring stiffness.The home side — clear underdogs in a game that Arsenal started in second place on the Premier League table and ended, however briefly, in first place — had looked confident at times in the first half, holding their own from the 20th to the 40th minute when they even managed to take the game deep into the Arsenal half.
But Trossard’s goal sucked the life out of the Wolves offense, and the side that returned to the pitch after the break lacked any of the brief moments of fire visible in the first half, falling flat on the attack and struggling to contain an increasingly confident Arsenal offense.
Odegaard delivered the final nail in the coffin, but the game was already over.Saturday’s result could prove crucial for Arsenal, who are currently locked in a three-way fight for the Premier League title with Manchester City and Liverpool. A loss could well have taken Arsenal out of the running completely, while the win lifts them to first place in the league, albeit with both Manchester City and Liverpool still to play on Sunday.
Wolves manager O’Neil remained positive despite the defeat.
“It was an incredible performance and one of my favorites, considering how tough I thought it was going to be for us,” O’Neil said in a post-match press conference. “For the lads to show the togetherness, the commitment and the workrate to push Arsenal as hard as we did, I thought it was an incredible effort from everyone.
“I’m very proud, although disappointed with the second goal, especially that it was really soft, and we didn’t deserve to lose 2-0. One-nil and not being able to score would probably have been the worst it could have been for us, but to lose the second one was really disappointing, but I’m really proud.
“It was an unbelievable performance and I can’t believe how well the lads did really with how short we are. Channy [Hwang] was just able to do more than 45, Mario [Lemina] came on as a number nine and did well as a nine, so it was an enjoyable evening which you don’t usually get if you lose, but I really enjoyed watching the lads, and I’m sure the supporters did as well.”
Wolves play two more Premier League games this week, against Bournemouth on Wednesday and Luton Town on Saturday. Both games will be at home at the Molineux.
