Arsenal: Arsene Wenger slams Premier League schedule ahead of West Ham opener

Arsene Wenger has been hugely critical of the schedule for the 2015/16 Premier League season, two days before his side are due to begin their campaign with a home clash against West Ham at the Emirates Stadium.

The top flight campaign commenced on 16 August last year, but the start has been brought forward by a week this time around and will finish seven days earlier in order to allow players extra recovery time prior to the Euro 2016 finals in France.

Such an action has left just six weeks between the end of the summer international schedule and the opening weekend of domestic action, something Wenger is against given that British football has not followed the example of leagues such as the Bundesliga and Serie A by introducing a winter break to reduce the demands traditionally associated with a hectic festive programme.

"I think it is a massive mistake for England to start one week earlier because you have no Christmas break," he said at a press conference, as quoted by Arsenal's official website.

"I don't know who came up with the idea that one game less at Christmas deserves one week holiday less, especially when you have a European Championship after the season. The difficulty nowadays is to find holidays for the players. In the Fifa rules, you have to give four weeks holiday to your players. Soon, if you want to do that, you start the season with the youth team because all your players should be on holiday when you start the season.

"If you make it earlier and the competition lasts longer... next season the European Championship plays with 24 teams and that makes the competition last longer. It lasts nearly a month now. So it will finish later and we will start the season earlier and that means the players have no holiday."

Wenger additionally bemoaned the fact that clubs such as Arsenal are not part of the decision-making process with regards to scheduling and lamented the potential impact of the quick turnaround on players who may be carrying injuries.

"I don't know why we weren't consulted," he added. "These kinds of decisions are taken in meetings where we are not involved. But a natural rest for a player – every doctor tells you that – from the micro-contusions on the bones takes six weeks to heal out completely. You had that in England before but no player gets that any more at the top level. They get two to three weeks."

Arsenal will be without Jack Wilshere for the next few weeks after it was revealed that the England midfielder sustained a hairline crack to his fibula in training prior to the Community Shield victory over Chelsea at Wembley, while Danny Welbeck remains sidelined with an ongoing knee problem and Tomas Rosicky is short of match fitness.

Alexis Sanchez was given a deserved break following his Copa America exploits with Chile on home turf last month, although Wenger claims the forward is in "surprisingly good shape" and should be available for full selection in approximately 10 days.