Arsenal: There is strength in youth, then there is Ainsley Maitland-Niles

Arsenal are getting younger, and their youth is getting stronger. But among all of this, Ainsley Maitland-Niles hasn’t even been mentioned.

A strange thing happened to me today. I was scrolling through the recent Arsenal news and came across an injury update. There was news about Laurent Koscielny and Konstantinos Mavropanos. Good stuff. And then there was stuff about… Ainsley Maitland-Niles?!

I have done a lot of gushing in the past couple of weeks. Gushing over the youth of this club, and how strong they have become. Alex Iwobi is coming into his element, still so young. Reiss Nelson is tearing it up in a substitute role for Hoffenheim.

Emile Smith Rowe nabbed his first goal as he does his best to make “the next Jack Wilshere” disappear, to be replaced by his own superiority. Meanwhile, Matteo Guendouzi has been impressing so much that he’s making team selection rather difficult.

But what about Ainsley Maitland-Niles? This guy was primed for a huge year before he suffered a lengthy leg injury that has kept him out for the entire season, barring 30 minutes against Manchester City.

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Maitland-Niles was long seen as the best of all of the aforementioned names. His versatility and unflappable demeanor were to die for, as he played like a hardy veteran more than an inexperienced whippersnapper.

Maitland-Niles is the crux that the future of this team can be built around. The toughest part is that it’s hard to find a place to put him. Everyone else conveniently fits somewhere in that XI, with clear obstacles in their way, but Maitland-Niles most sensibly tucks in next to Guendouzi, who has already been bounced in favor of the epic Torreira/Xhaka pairing.

He could conceivably fit into the No. 10 role, assuming he can master his creative tendencies, but that role looks ticketed for someone like Miguel Almiron, or another similar, young signing.

I still think that Maitland-Niles has one of the best trajectories of any of the youngsters here. He has proven more, can do more, has more upward mobility, and really just needs a set in stone position to call his own, otherwise we are doing Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain all over again.

The first step is getting him back healthy, which sounds like it’s right around the corner. It may come at the expense of Mohamed Elneny, but after Maitland-Niles gets back healthy, I think he needs to slide in next to Guendouzi in the side competitions. The partnership of the future.