Arsenal.com have reported that Jack Wilshere has had successful surgery on his knee in Sweden. Wilshere has suffered from several injury setbacks since he was stretchered off with an ankle injury picked up against New York Red Bulls all the way back in July, and did not feature at all for Arsenal during the 2011/12 campaign.

The suggestion is that although this latest surgery will not add any time onto his recovery, Jack will still need at least another two months of rehabilitation. This categorically rules him out of Team GB, so Stuart Pearce can finally get it into his head that there are other talented young players who are very capable of representing England at the Olympics!

It is thought that Arsène Wenger wants to take Jack on Arsenal’s pre-season tour of Asia and Nigeria in late July/August as he rebuilds his fitness and looks to be ready for next season. Pearce had previously stated that Wilshere was included on the 80-man shortlist for Team GB against the wishes of Wenger, but it looks like Le Boss has finally got his way. In my opinion, Jack is much better off taking his time with the Arsenal medical team than trying to push himself for a competition which is clearly playing second fiddle to the Euro’s anyway.

“Jack Wilshere has successfully undergone a minor procedure on his left knee as planned on Tuesday afternoon.

“The 20 year-old midfielder had the procedure in Sweden and will continue his rehabilitation in the coming days back at Arsenal.

“This procedure is not expected to significantly affect Jack’s return date in the summer.”

In other news, Manuel Almunia is one of 7 players who will be released by Arsenal when their contracts end on the 30th of June. Almunia, George Brislen-Hall, Gavin Hoyte, Sean McDermott, Rhys Murphy, James Campbell and Jeffrey Monakana have not had their contracts with the club renewed and will need to start looking elsewhere so that they can join new teams for pre-season.

Almunia made 175 first-team appearances for Arsenal, including being brought on for Robert Pires 20 minutes into the 2006 Champions League final against Barcelona because Jens Lehmann had been sent off. Despite a few decent seasons for Arsenal, his appearances have become few and far between since the emergence of Wojciech Szczesny. In fact, Almunia did not play a single first-team game for Arsenal last season, but did feature in a few games for West Ham on an emergency loan.