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Arsenal, OFFICIAL: Mkhitaryan misses the Europa League final for political reasons

Arsenal, OFFICIAL: Mkhitaryan misses the Europa League final for political reasons

Henrikh Mkhitaryan will not take part in the Europa League final against Chelsea. Arsenal today made the announcement official, explaining that the Armenian midfielder will not be part of the squad for the trip to Baku trip.  They said that as they could not guarantee their players safety they would not take the risk of bringing him to Azerbaijan.

Azerbaijan and Armenia are contending for political control of the Nagomo-Karabakh region and in the past Mkhitaryan had decided not to travel to Baku. Despite the mediation of the Azeri ambassador, it was not considered appropriate to risk taking the player, even after the contacts between the Londoners and the UEFA. 

 

They said in their statement, "We have written to Uefa expressing our deep concerns about this situation. We have thoroughly explored all the options for Micki to be part of the squad but after discussing this with Micki and his family we have collectively agreed he will not be in our travelling party. We're also very sad that a player will miss out on a major European final in circumstances such as this, as it is something that comes along very rarely in a footballer's career."