Wenger sold Toure to play Djourou

Johan Djourou has revealed that Arsène Wenger had planned to make him a more permanent member of the first-team this season.

Djourou made 13 Premiership starts last term, but a knee injury has kept him out for the entire season.

The Swiss defender is disappointed not to have taken advantage of the departure of key defender Kolo Touré last summer.

He told Arsenal.com: "I was really confident about being able to play this season.

"The boss said to me, 'I let Kolo go for you to play'. It is the thing you don't want to hear when you are injured but it is the truth. It is difficult to take on but I swallowed it and I will fight for my place next season, that is for sure."

The Swiss international went on to say that he had been having problems with his knee already towards the end of last season, but he didn't realise how serious it would become.

He explained: "I'd had it for a while. I had been playing with it since the end of the season before so sometimes I had my knee being swollen up after games but it wasn't that painful.

"It got to the point that it was very painful and I just couldn't do anything so I had to go in for an operation.

"At the time I wasn't [aware how serious it was] because I thought I had swelling for no reason because I had no pain. I was wondering why so we had to do scans and things like that.

"Then, when I heard [the extent of the injury], it was a bit of a shock for me because it was something quite big and you never know what can happen with injuries like this with the knee. It is always difficult to take."

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