Mikel Arteta says Arsenal will keep new signing Mikel Merino close to the squad after the midfielder picked up an injury in his very first training session.

Merino, who joined Arsenal on Tuesday from Real Sociedad for £31.6million, injured his shoulder in training on Thursday.

The midfielder is now set for a spell on the sidelines, with Arsenal ordering further scans on him to learn the extent of the damage.

Arteta will hope it is not serious, but either way Merino will be kept close to the squad to help him adapt to his new surroundings even while he is out injured.

“Well, he had the incident and he carried on playing - and training,” said Arteta. “And at some point we were looking at him and thought he did not look right.

“That shows you how much he wanted it and he did not want to accept that was happening in that moment.

“But actually, that is what happened and now let’s use the time that we have, right now, to make sure he is familiar with everything that we are doing, how we live and what we expect of him, about our team dynamics.

“He will be in every team meeting as well. We will use the time in the best possible way and in a few weeks he will be ready.

“It is very disappointing because you can feel the pain of the player as well.

“We fought so hard for three months to get the player over the line. The club made a huge effort to bring him in and on day one for that to happen, it’s a huge blow.

“But his reaction has been exceptional straight away. We signed him for many years, not for a few weeks and we need to move on.

“These things can happen, it is very unfortunate but this is our reality.”