De Gea Could Face The Gunners

Louis van Gaal is hopeful goalkeeper David De Gea will return to face Arsenal on Sunday after missing Manchester United's last three games.

The Spain international was injured in the warm-up of the Reds' Europa League first leg tie away to Midtjylland eight days ago and has since been receiving treatment.

Van Gaal said at the time he believed De Gea's problem was not too serious and the manager hopes he will be able to call upon the stopper at Old Trafford this weekend, but there remains a doubt over defender Chris Smalling, who sat out Thursday night's 5-1 second-leg win over the Danish side.

"I expect [David can return] because I saw the way he was today," said van Gaal during a briefing with reporters after Thursday night's win. "Chris is a question mark, but you never know," he added.

Further question marks remain over the fitness of Anthony Martial, who the Reds lost in the warm-up before the second leg, but there was some positive injury news with the return to action of Marcos Rojo after nearly three months out, and both Antonio Valencia and Marouane Fellaini are seemingly not too far away from full fitness either.

Asked whether Martial would be available against Arsene Wenger's side, van Gaal admitted: "I don’t know because it has happened before the match. I’ve talked with him. I have talked with the physiotherapist that already had control of him. I cannot say, but it is not as heavy as everybody thinks, but you never know.

"I’m very happy with Marcos that he played 10 or 15 minutes and how he showed already his form and shape, he was very good. But I have to build him up in the games and that’s not so easy, because he only had two training sessions with me. On the first day, he was with the second team and, on the second day, he was with us. So I take also a risk to do that, but I think that I have to do that now with 15 minutes and then 30 minutes and like that and I hope we can build him up.

"Valencia is also coming back and Fellaini too - in the month of March, a lot of players are coming back and then we have a strong selection again."