Arsenal Vs Ostersunds: Konstantinos Mavropanos sighting?

Konstantinos Mavropanos has been turning heads since he signed for Arsenal in early January. Could Thursday’s second leg hosting of FK Ostersunds be his first sighting in the senior side?

Arsenal will regularly sign youth prospects. Because of the low-risk, high-reward nature of the signing, they are well worth the investment. Cheap to buy, cheap to run, with the potential for a world-class talent. But great turbulence and uncertainty come with their signings. Their development is difficult to predict and steer.

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As a result, it makes sense to sign a lot of them, playing the numbers’ game, betting on the probability that one or two of the rolls of the dice pay off. It is, after all, better to spend £2 million ten times to acquire one, two or more players worth many more times over. And that is the strategy that Arsene Wenger has been happy to try time and time again, often times finding great joy in doing so.

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The latest young punt is a young Greek defender who has never played a senior minute of football away from his homeland. Konstantinos Mavropanos, who very few had heard of before his £2-million move to North London early on in the January transfer window, signed with the Gunners in an archetypal Wenger move.

This time, though, there were heavy hints of a Sven Mislintat influence — the Swedish scout had reportedly highlighted and extolled of the skills of Mavropanos to Borussia Dortmund before he was hired by Arsenal. That cast doubt on whether Wenger would actually use Mavropanos. Wenger himself admitted that he would be sent out on loan. But within a week, he retracted such comments, implying that the 20-year-old had impressed so substantially in training that he saw a use for him in the first-team squad this season.

Since that time, Mavropanos has continued to showcase his natural blend of size, deceptive speed, power, and game intelligence in a series of under-23 matches. That has led many to question whether we will get to see him in the senior starting XI at all this season.

Well, while I do not know the answer to that question, I believe that if we are to see Mavropanos in action, then it will come on Thursday in the second leg against FK Ostersunds. After a 3-0 win in the first leg, the tie is all but secure and Wenger will be keen to rotate his squad. But with Arsenal already out of the FA Cup, the Carabao Cup drawing to a close just three days later, and the Europa League nearing its climax, it is difficult to see how he will be given any serious game time.

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Hopefully, Wenger will thurst Mavropanos into action. I am very keen to see him in the first team. But with Rob Holding, Calum Chambers and even Per Mertesacker all waiting in the wings, he has some competition to fight through. It might be nice, but I’m not sure it will happen.