The north London derby between Tottenham and Arsenal is set to be postponed after the Premier League accepted a request from depleted Gunner side.
Sportsmail exclusively revealed on Friday that the Gunners had filed an application for the clash with bitter rivals Tottenham to be called off.
They have at least a dozen players unavailable because of positive Covid cases, injuries, suspension and international duty at the Africa Cup of Nations.
And the Premier League accepted Arsenal's request on Saturday, with Spurs likely to be furious as a result.
The rules state that clubs are required to fulfil Premier League fixtures provided they have 13 outfield players and one goalkeeper who are either part of the senior squad or 'appropriately experienced Under-21s.'
But Mikel Arteta's squad is so depleted they couldn't even muster that number of players for one of their biggest games of the season.
Thomas Partey, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Mohamed Elneny and Nicolas Pepe are away in Cameroon for the ongoing AFCON competition.
Granit Xhaka is suspended after his red card against Liverpool in the Carabao Cup semi-final on Thursday night.
Martin Odegaard is the one known Covid case at the club but Calum Chambers, Cedric Soares, Kieran Tierney, Takehiro Tomiyasu, Emile Smith Rowe and Bukayo Saka are all injury doubts.
The quantity of injury doubts raised suspicion at Tottenham and it also didn't go unnoticed that Arsenal let Ainsley Maitland-Niles and Folarin Balogun leave on loan in recent days.
Arsenal's Under-23 side were also in action on Friday night, drawing 1-1 with West Ham, with a potential argument some of those players could have been called into the senior squad by Arteta.
It is the second Premier League fixture to fall by the wayside this weekend after Saturday's Burnley vs Leicester City game was postponed.
