Arsenal: Reiss Nelson saying all the right things

Reiss Nelson lost his starting spot in the Arsenal team to Nicolas Pepe this weekend. However, in response, the 19-year-old is saying all the right things.

When Arsenal entered the summer transfer window, the need that most saw as the greatest was a wide, dribbling, speedy, direct attacker. After the departures of Alexis Sanchez, Theo Walcott and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, all in a six-month period, there was a clear lack of dynamism in the wide areas of the Arsenal attack.

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Unai Emery was quite aware of this, having to adapt central players like Alex Iwobi and Henrikh Mkhitaryan to wide roles, despite neither ever really feeling comfortable there. And so, the Gunners made a splash, signing Nicolas Pepe in a club-record £72 million deal.

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That immediately saw 19-year-old academy product Reiss Nelson drop down the pecking order. Nelson is a prestigious talent, built very much in the mould of the type of player Emery was looking for this summer. However, after an inconsistent loan season at Hoffenheim and concerns about his reliability as a full-time starter throughout the season, it was deemed necessary to sign a more established winger.

Nelson, however, started the season on the left flank, named in the starting XI for both matches against Newcastle United and Burnley. But with Pepe making second-half cameos in his place, it became clear that the starting switch was imminent.

And so, this weekend, Emery made his personnel move, dropping Nelson to the bench and starting Pepe, actually fielding him as a part of a striking duo alongside Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang. Nelson, I am sure, was disappointed to drop to the bench, but when asked about his prospects for the season ahead after the match, he said all the right things:

"“All the competition that’s here, all the new wingers Arsenal have signed… I think this could be my time. I need to just keep training hard and getting all the information from the coaches and the players. If I do that, I’m going to have a big, big shout this season. It’s about taking those steps, doing the easy thing and getting the basics right first. Once I do that, I think I will get chances. Then it’s up to me to perform and do well for the team.”"

Nelson has always been a highly ambitious individual. He pushed for starts at the senior level at 18 and was willing to walk away from Arsenal altogether, his boyhood club, if he was not assured of progression down the line. He is talented and he wants to fulfil that talent. And this ambition, allied with an innate competitive nature, is precisely what is required to fight for a place in a team.

At this present stage, Pepe is a superior player to Nelson. Very few would argue with that. But it was encouraging that Emery dropped Henrikh Mkhitaryan against Burnley upon Alexandre Lacazette’s return, not the Hale End graduate. Nelson would do well to beat out Pepe, but Mkhitaryan is certainly someone he can move ahead of in the pecking order.

What this season brings for Nelson remains to be seen. But opportunities are there for him to take hold of his potential and flourish. He now just has to recognise them and then take them. At this early stage, though, optimism abounds because Nelson is saying all the right things.