Arsenal have confirmed Henrikh Mkhitaryan won’t be able to participate in the Europa League final.
The Armenian player was given all kind of assurances regarding his safety during the Europa League final but UEFA had failed to provide a necessary guarantee. The final will take place in Baku on 29th of May as the North Londoners will face Chelsea in the Europa League final.
Baku happens to be in Azerbaijan which has a long standing dispute with Armenia regarding the ownership of the Nagorno-Karabakh region.
Arsenal released an official statement on their website: We are very disappointed to announce that Henrikh Mkhitaryan will not be travelling with the squad for our Uefa Europa League final against Chelsea.
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 have written to Uefa expressing our deep concerns about this situation. Micki has been a key player in our run to the final so this is a big loss for us from a team perspective.
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.
Micki will continue to be part of our preparations until we depart for Baku at the weekend.”
