Arsenal: A wishlist for the 2020/21 season

Solving the youth conundrum

Arsenal have a crop of exciting teenagers that have burst onto the scene over the course of the season. That is a tremendous blessing and makes the future prospects of the team extremely exciting indeed. But over the next year, the club must begin to decipher how to manage each such that their careers are maximised. With that in mind, here are some categories that the club could define their talents by.

Invaluable: Gabriel Martinelli, Bukayo Saka and to an extent Matteo Guendouzi. These are players that Arsenal need to continue building and do whatever necessary to retain. With Saka on the verge of contract talks, it is of utmost importance that the club tie down his long-term future. These three players could potentially form the nucleus for great Arsenal teams to come.

Good but not Great: Eddie Nketiah, Ainsley Maitland-Niles, Reiss Nelson and Joe Willock. Maitland-Niles might have slipped out of the team under Arteta, but his performances were superb in the inverted right-back role. With patience, hard work, and opportunity, he can still be a hugely influential player. Nketiah is earning his credibility as Alexandre Lacazette’s understudy, while both Reiss Nelson and Joe Willock haven’t been able to put forth consistent performances throughout the season. This is particularly damning as Nicolas Pepe and most of Arsenal’s midfield haven’t exactly been undroppable. That said, these players do have the raw talent really set the stage alight.

Time Running Out: Dinos Mavropanos, Rob Holding and to an extent Emile Smith-Rowe. When he first broke into the Arsenal set-up, Mavropanos looked like a roaming, domineering, authoratative centre-back. That would turn out to be premature and wildly inaccurate hype. Persistent injuries and a lack of opportunities seem to have put Mavropanos out of the picture. Holding is an even more disappointing case. He should have made one of the center-back spots his own, but after some excellent performances at the earlier part of his Arsenal career, he doesn’t seem to be feature in Arteta’s plans and has struggled to prove his fitness. Smith Rowe, meanwhile, is a curious case and he is only in this category because he could have had more opportunities considering that neither Willock nor Ozil were doing very well earlier in the year. Despite this, he has performed excellently on loan for Huddersfield Town and will only turn 20 this summer.

Honourable Mentions: Kieran Tierney and Calum Chambers have been left out of this entry simply because they have been starting-calibre players when fit.