Arsenal: Emile Smith Rowe name drop sets tangible goal

Arsenal youngster Emile Smith Rowe has dropped the name that he hopes to emulate, and while it’s a big ask, it sets a goal, and now it’s up to him to achieve it.

It’s always fun when young players spring up from the ranks and establish themselves as potential first-team candidates. Arsenal have had a lot of the like appear, but few who have followed through on that initial burst of potential.

Emile Smith Rowe is one of the new wave that will hope to upset that. And, to give us a tangible goal to attach to him, he was very open about who he aspires to emulate during his time at the Emirates – Kevin De Bruyne.

The Belgian attacker has been a revolutionary presence in the Premier League, and really the only person who has threatened to upset Mesut Ozil’s reign as the king of the assist. De Bruyne certainly benefits from having such profound attacking talents around him, but the individual talent he has is something I wish the Gunners had.

Which makes what Smith Rowe said so magical. Of course we want our own Kevin De Bruyne, who doesn’t? But more than that, De Bruyne remains as perhaps the No. 1 player that I wish the Gunners had some version of.

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Mesut Ozil is the closest success-wise and Henrikh Mkhitaryan is the closest style-wise, but both are past 30 and spent their best years somewhere else. De Bruyne is currently in the heat of his best years, spending them right at Manchester City.

I’m never a fan of the comparison. I hated when Torreira was compared to Kante, because it sets an immediate bar that the player then has to either live up to, or risk being branded unsuccessful solely because he wasn’t the same as someone else.

In Smith Rowe’s situation, I think it’s a bit different. He’s aspiring to be Arsenal’s version of De Bruyne, which is a much more attainable task when spoken by an 18-year-old who is just breaching the first team picture showcasing all kinds of talent, I’m oddly okay with it. Maybe it’s the deep-seated desire to have a De Bruyne at the club, maybe it’s the belief that he really is something special.

Whatever the case, Smith Rowe has set his own bar, now it is up to him to rise to the occasion and reach that bar or find something else to categorize himself as.