Arsenal: Gabriel Martinelli shafting justified by “appearances”

Arsenal’s youth system got the shaft from the CIES Football Observatory, who justified excluding Gabriel Martinelli from the top 20 by blaming a lack of appearances.

In case you haven’t heard, and have been caught in what few other Arsenal headlines you can find out there these days, the CIES Football Observatory gave us all something to talk about, unleashing a detailed ranking of the best youth players out there.

This would normally be exciting for Gooners, since we’re all well aware that we’re currently stacked. But unfortunately, the rankings had only one Gunner in the top 20—William Saliba at No. 20.

Gabriel Martinelli, the guy who has ten goals and four assists in his first-ever year in the Premier and Europa Leagues, ranked in at a dismal 21st.

I thought I was done writing about this after yesterday, but then my article appeared on Twitter, shared by the CIES Football Observatory, with their justification for excluding Gabriel Martinelli from their top 20 youth rankings. Their justification was a lack of appearances.

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Fine. I get that. Martinelli’s £23m valuation would improve when he’s played some more minutes.

But the problem with that logic is that Mason Greenwood ranked in at £47m, and he hasn’t done much more than Martinelli, way up at eight on the list. Greenwood has played 1227 minutes in the Prem and Europa Leagues. Martinelli has played 1081. Greenwood has 10 goals one assist, Martinelli has six goals and two assists. I won’t get into how Martinelli is crushing Greenwood in the League and FA Cup goal production race. That’s none of my business.

Hell, even throw in Phil Foden over at Manchester City. He’s only played 1232 minutes and managed four goals and four assists in that time, yet he’s ranking in at the exact same valuation as Greenwood.

At the end of the day, this really doesn’t matter. It’s a construct that means nothing. I won’t suddenly think less of Martinelli just because some construct out there doesn’t rate him properly. But that doesn’t take away from how truly annoying it is that even when we have the youth system to be excited about, it still isn’t recognized.

Oh, and don’t forget that Bukayo Saka wasn’t even on the list. At all. Bukayo Saka, who has played 1800 minutes and nabbed two goals and eight assists. Please, tell me more about playtime and production, I’d love to hear all about it. Okay, I’m done this time, I swear.