Arsenal wonderkid's sub appearance delayed for bizarre reason as fans joke 'his mum will be fuming'

Arsenal youngster’s Myles Lewis-Skelly had his substitution appearance delayed for a bizarre reason against Shakhtar Donetsk.

On Tuesday the Gunners claimed a hard fought 1-0 victory over ​​Shakhtar, despite Leandro Trossard missing a spot-kick and Riccardo Calafiori being forced off with an injury.

Arsenal bounced back from Saturday’s 2-0 loss over Bournemouth, beating ​​Shakhtar courtesy of Gabriel Martinelli's shot hitting the post and bouncing in off keeper Dmytro Riznyk.

Among the game’s subplots was Calafiori being forced off upon jarring his knee in the second half. He was replaced by Lewis-Skelly.

However, the Premier League outfit were briefly down to ten men after Calafiori limped off the pitch, with the fourth official delaying Lewis-Skelly’s arrival, instructing the England youngster to remove the earring in his left ear before taking to the field.

Lewis-Skelly waved his arms in protest before frantically trying to remove the piece of jewellery. He ultimately arrived onto the field 70 seconds after he was originally meant to.

Fans were quick to react on social media. One person said on X: "Myles Lewis-Skelly trying to come on for Arsenal with a brand new earring taped over. 4th official not having it.”

Another added:"They made Lewis-Skelly take out his fresh piercing. He better hope that don’t heal up and close on him."

While a third joked: "Lewis-Skelly’s mum is gonna be fuming. His entry into a champions league game was delayed because he has to take his earring off."

Elsewhere, on Califiori’s injury, Mikel Arteta said: "He had to come off because he felt something. I don't know the extent of that. So, in that sense, not great news."

The Arsenal boss added: "There were two very different halves. In the first one we were very dominant and created four big chances. We should have put the game to bed with the amount of dominance and territory we had.

"We looked tired. We lacked that sharpness with and without the ball to regain the ball in the right moments and areas, and we gave certain balls away that allowed certain transitions. We had chances again and missed a penalty.

"That emotion was difficult to overcome and then we had to dig in. We played two nights ago with players coming from internationals after flying from Brazil and many countries, so I was expecting a bit of a drop-off.

"And the fact that we put so much in the first half and didn't get the distance in terms of the scoreline, I think we paid a bit for that.

"Then we made life more difficult for us because we started give the ball away in not the right areas and then it was more open. That didn't help. But we have now four days. Believe me, come Sunday we'll be flying.

"We'll review, have a day off, then two days to prepare the game. Sunday is far away and we are more than comfortable that we'll be in the right place."