Arsenal's on-loan midfielder Jack Wilshere suffers ankle injury during Bournemouth loss

Arsenal midfielder Jack Wilshere currently on loan at Bournemouth suffered an ankle injury during the Cherries' 2-0 loss against Manchester City on Monday night (13 February).

The 25-year-old midfielder was replaced by Benik Afobe during added time in the first-half after picking up a knock on his ankle and Eddie Howe is hoping that it is a minor one. Wilshere has been impressive since moving to the south coast club making 20 appearances in the Premier League.

The England international left Arsenal in the summer to join Bournemouth in order to get regular playing time and regain full fitness after missing big chunks in recent seasons through multiple injury problems. The last time Wilshere made over 20 appearances in the Premier League was during the 2013/14 season.

Wilshere has been a regular under Howe in recent months – starting 18 of his 20 matches thus far including completing the full 90 minutes in 13 of them. The Cherries' last victory in the league came on 31 December against Swansea City and Howe has admitted that the England midfielder's quality will be needed if they are to get back to winning ways sooner rather than later.

Apart from Wilshere, Bournemouth also lost Simon Francis to a hamstring injury in the first-half of their game against City, and the manager admitted that it was a major disadvantage against a side that is competing for the title.

"Jack is just feeling his ankle. I don't think there's a major injury there. He just felt he couldn't move as freely as he wanted to and had a pain in his ankle, so we took him off," Howe said after the game, as quoted by ESPN.

"Losing both players within one half of football was a huge blow. To lose a player of Jack's quality was a huge blow. We had a go, but ultimately [City] were too good.

"Simon felt his hamstring and Jack had a pain in his ankle, we will reassess both injuries and hopefully they are nothing serious," the Cherries boss added.