FC Barcelona coach Pep Guardiola made public today a list of 20 players who will travel to Ukraine for the team’s Champions League match against Dynamo Kiev this Wednesday, reports Catalan sports papers Sport and El Mundo Deportivo.

Cup-tied Ukrainian defender Dmytro Chygrynskiy was also included in the list. (Ed. possibly to give him the opportunity to celebrate with his new team when they make the qualification, to give him that sense of belonging. )

Jeffren, with discomfort in his knee, is the only player out however, since even the Argentine Gaby Milito has entered the list, 19 months after his serious injury.

The coaching staff nevertheless must discard one of the names, and submit to match officials a 19-player list before kick-off, as per Champions League regulation.

The 20-players are: Goalkeepers Valdes and Pinto; Defenders Alves, Puyol, Pique, Marquez, Abidal, Maxwell, Milto and Chygrynskiy (cup-tied); Midfielders Xavi, Keita, Iniesta, Busquets and Toure; Forwards Messi, Pedro, Ibrahimovic, Bojan and Henry.

The Blaugrana expedition will travel to Ukraine tomorrow morning.

Beset with injuries to his frontline players, Arsenal’s boss Arsene Wenger said he’s thinking of entering the January transfer market for a striker, and British tabloid ‘Daily Star’ again claims Barcelona 19-year-old striker, Bojan Krkic is one of his targets.

With Dutch ace Robin van Persie missing for the next five months with an ankle injury, on top of other short-term injuries to players such as William Gallas (hamstring), Emmanuel Eboue (muscle), Armand Traore (hamstring), Andrei Arshavin (ankle) and Tomas Rosicky (groin), the Gunners manager admitted he needs to review the team’s situation.

“We pick up more injuries than the other big teams, that is true,” Wenger told FIFA.com a few days ago, “You cannot say there is not a reason for it but we have not found it yet. It’s the worst season for injuries for us. And they are all in the same area – in the offensive side. Last year it was in the defensive side.”

“I want to see if we will be in the same position as we are now at the beginning of January.”

Having conceded that big-money swoops for Inter’s Mario Balotelli, Wolfsburg’s Edin Dzeko, Bordeaux’s Marouane Chamakh and Toulouse’s Andre-Pierre Gignac are unlikely to materialise, Wenger has turned his attention to the out-of-favour Camp Nou talent, claimed the Daily Star.

Wenger however acknowledged the difficulty in finding the perfect candidate midway through the season saying, “Let’s not dream too much that in January we will be able to find a world class player, because that is what is needed to improve our squad, and who is not cup-tied in Europe and who is free (given permission to move). You’d need a good Father Christmas for that.”

Arsenal was claimed by the paper to already have made an initial inquiry and would be prepared to offer up to 9 million euros.

Right-back, Dani Alves and winger, Jeffren Suarez were the only absentees in Barcelona’s training session this morning due to physical discomforts they felt though both are expected to be available for selection next Wednesday against Dynamo Kyiv, reports Spanish news agency EFE.

The coach, Pep Guardiola, worked with virtually the entire team to prepare for “the most important match of the season”, as he said it after winning against Deportivo last Saturday (1-3).

Alves could not exercise because of a knock he suffered to his left instep, while Jeffren, who did not play in Riazor, has a right knee contusion.

After receiving his ‘Golden Ball’ in Paris, just hours after playing in Riazor, Messi trained normally today along with the rest of his teamates at the Ciutat Esportivo Sant Joan Despí.

N.B. The instep is located on top of the foot. Many people get the instep confused with the arch. The arch is the cavity on the bottom of the foot and the instep is on the top of the foot.

A knee contusion is a bruise to the soft tissue over the knee joint. A contusion may be caused by a blow to the knee, or may be caused by a knee sprain or fracture.

We all know it is slow news day when sports papers start doing math, and so it does when Catalan daily Sport today has a report about Barcelona’s new centre-forward Zlatan Ibrahimovic goal tally in the league so far this season.

Having participated in 12 of the la Liga leader’s 14 matches, the Swede is calculated to have played a total of 892 minutes by the paper – 7 complete matches, 2 where he was substituted and 3 coming off the bench. With 10 goals scored from those matches, Sport comes to the conclusion that the striker is scoring an average of 1 goal per match i.e. 89.2 minutes – d**h.

By comparison, at this point last season, Samuel Eto’o has scored 4 more goals than Ibrahimovic but gained them in fits such as a hat-trick against Almeria and 4 against Valladolid, in a team that was firing hot on all cylinders, while the Swede distributed his contribution more evenly with a brace only against Zaragoza and failing to register any in three matches.

The Cameroonian had an unbelievable first half of the season and seemed destined to set a league record, but failed to reach it after a poor ending to the season, denying him the ‘Pichichi’ title, which went to Atletico Madrid’s Diego Forlan.

Ibra’s challenge, should he wish to accept it, is to keep the bar high until the end of the campaign and thus set a figure close to or even surpass the 30 goals that Eto’o achieved.

So far, Zlatan’s best streak came at the start of the league, just when he needed them the most in order to gain the public’s trust, many of whom are unconvinced of the necessity to hire him. The footballer scored in the first five consecutive matchdays before he complains of some physical ailments that made him miss a couple of games – in the Mestalla and San Mames – before firing blanks against Osasuna and Mallorca. His ‘nose’ for goals has been revived in the last week however, and has scored once in all of Barcelona’s last three league encounters, no more bigger and significant than in el Clasico.

Zlatan has not only proven himself to be a natural goalscorer, he also helps improve the effectiveness of his teammates. The striker has already served four assists in the league, including two splendid back heels for Piqué and Pedro to score off – a luxury of a footballer who plays the collective game like few in the world.

Ibrahimovic has greatly helped his teammates, but he has also benefited from the passes of his teammates. Messi has so far been his main ally. The Argentine has already served him three passes to convert into goals, with Alves and Abidal providing two assists each. Further proof that the team have benefited when they have the number ‘9′ as the reference point, as he has off them.