Arsenal can perform Gabriel Jesus U-turn after UEFA rule change but only in nightmare scenario

UEFA rule change could help Arsenal U-turn on Gabriel Jesus decision and improve his reintegration after long-term injury

Gabriel Jesus has recently returned to training with his Arsenal teammates. The Brazilian has been missing since January, when he suffered a serious knee injury against Manchester United.

As a result, the Gunners left him out of their UEFA Champions League squad at the start of the 2025/26 season. It was a decision which had puzzled some with the Brazilian believed to be back for the final two games of the league phase in January being a possibility.

Now that he has returned to training in November, there would have been a chance he might even be back on the pitch in December with the club facing Brugge on the 10th of the same month. Mikel Arteta hoped at the time that their decision might be proven wrong.

“He had a major surgery that it was going to take him many, many months,” he said when asked about Jesus being left out in September. “So, after discussing with the medical staff and understanding the schedule that we had and when we thought that he could be available, that it would be between December and January, we decided to make the call like we’ve done it in the past with other players.

"Hopefully, we did it wrong, and he comes back earlier. But at the moment, the provision was very clear.”

Despite not being registered, a change to the UEFA rule book could yet allow Arsenal to bring Jesus back into the European fold sooner. Clubs can admit a temporary replacement of just one outfield player who is ruled out for an extended period of time, with a long-term injury or illness, according to the guidelines.

This rule is, however, only applicable up to the sixth matchday, which in Arsenal’s case would be the trip to Brugge. Chelsea and Liverpool have exercised this rule with Facundo Buonanotte replacing Dario Essugo and Federico Chiesa replacing Giovanni Leoni, respectively.

Were the Gunners, and it should be added this would not be a desired outcome, to suffer a serious injury in any of their matches before the submission of the squad for the sixth matchday, Jesus could be added to the squad. Arteta has been very complimentary when asked recently by football.london what Jesus brings that is different to Viktor Gyokeres and Kai Havertz.

“Well, again, a player that is very unpredictable, full of energy, super competitive, a player that comes from a context of difficulty in the last few seasons for various nasty injuries,” he said. “So the level of hunger and desire that he's going to bring to the team is going to be amazing. So I'm thrilled to have him, I think he's going to add something extra to the team that we don't have and make sure that very soon we see him on that pitch making an impact for the team.”