Partey's injury is putting Arsenal under pressure - Mikel Arteta

Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta hopes to have Thomas Partey available for selection again in the near future.

The midfielder has not featured for the Gunners since he was substituted at half-time of the 3-0 loss to Aston Villa on November 8.

Partey's injury turned out to be worse than first suspected and he was again absent from the squad for the 4-1 win against Rapid Vienna in the Europa League on Thursday.

With the north London derby against Tottenham coming up on Sunday, Arteta is anxiously waiting on good news regarding the 27-year-old.

"He's putting a lot of pressure on us," Arteta said when asked about Partey's condition at a press conference after the victory against the Austrian side.

"He's training tomorrow with us and let's see how it goes in the next couple of days."

Arsenal protected their perfect record in the Europa League group stage this season when they demolished Rapid and Arteta was happy with the way his side played.

"The aggressiveness is always there but the margins in the Premier League are so much smaller, when you make a mistake you pay the price," he said to BT Sport.

"We haven't been as ruthless in the final third in the Premier League as we have in Europe, but I liked the reaction of the team and the performance today.

"Many of them I am delighted with, the injured players who been out for so long they worked so hard we are so glad to have them back, to add numbers to the squad. [Alexandre] Lacazaette it was great to have him on the score sheet, some really good individual performances and some of the good from the young boys as well.

"The club has made such an effort to make sure today everything was set up in the right way so hopefully the fans had a good night, they were tremendous for us."

The Spanish coach will consider making few changes to the starting XI on Sunday after the midweek display.

"We've seen that a lot of players playing on a Thursday who have strong performances in Europa who then play on Saturday as well, so yes I will be thinking about this performance [when picking the team]," he said.