Vivianne Miedema has been nominated for the Barclay’s WSL Player of the Month Award for December, but the recognition arrives as a cruel irony, with the Arsenal striker rupturing her anterior cruciate ligament in the Gunner’s penultimate match of 2022.
Miedema was stretchered off in tears in her team's Champions League group stage clash with Lyon and announced afterwards that the ACL injury would preclude the Dutch star from playing in the Women’s World Cup this summer in Australia and New Zealand.
The injury is the second of its kind to afflict Jonas Eidevall’s squad, with England forward and Miedema's off-field partner Beth Mead suffering the same injury a month prior. Both are expected to be out for extended periods, exacerbating an already injury-riddled squad.
The absences mark huge losses for Arsenal’s bid to disrupt the established order. Heading into the second half of the season, Eidevall’s side sit three points behind reigning champions Chelsea but with a game in hand.
After taking a voluntary step away from the pitch earlier in the season following a turgid time in front of goal that saw Miedema relegated to the bench, the 26-year-old was relishing a conspicuous return to the form that earned her the title of WSL’s all-time leading goalscorer since moving to north London in 2017.
In the month of December, Miedema scored in all three matches for the Gunners leading up to the Lyon fixture, helping her side to two 1-0 victories in the process to keep them within touching distance of rivals Chelsea in the league and in good stead in Europe.
Arsenal return to WSL action with a potential title-decider against the Blues on 15 January.
Speaking ahead of the winter break, Eidevall made it clear that the January transfer window would be utilised but preached caution that the priority must lie in recruiting players with finesse in the final third.
"That is one of the challenges of this transfer window," he said. "That we need to recruit players that can give us an end product, because that is certainly one of the measurable factors that we have lost with those two players (Mead and Miedema). We need to take that into consideration."
Miedema is nominated for the December award alongside Manchester United’s Ona Batlle and Leah Galton, Guro Reiten and Fran Kirby of Chelsea, Laura Coombs of Manchester City and Emily Ramsey of Everton, with the winner to be announced in due course.
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