Although the only senior player to arrive at Arsenal this summer was Petr Cech, the Gunners have been busy bringing in lots of highly-rated young stars to be taught “The Arsenal Way” via the Academy.
The Gunners brought in Krystian Bielik in the New Year and added some great prospects in Jeff Reine-Adelaide, Yassin Fortune, Kostas Pileas, Vlad Dragomir, Donyell Malen and Jordi Osei-Tutu over the course of this transfer window, and now the 17 year-old Ismael Bennacer has been confirmed as signing a five year contract with Arsenal.
He has been playing in the French Third tier with AC Arles-Avignon, but it has been rumoured that Manchester City were favourites to sign him before Arsenal stepped in.
The youngster himself has now announced his move in the Express, and admitted that he was a bit overawed when he saw the size of Arsenal’s operations. “That is what made me a little scared at the beginning, but when I saw the condition of the training centre, I realised that there isn’t a better place for me to progress.
“It is up to me to prove myself, they gave me a five-year contract so they must have confidence in me.”
Arsenal seem to be stepping up their search for young talent even more than usual as prices rise to astronomical numbers for proven performers. This has been justified with the emergence of Hector Bellerin last season, and Chuba Akpom, Jeff Reine-Adelaide and Alex Iwobi impressed in this pre-season too. Gideon Zelalem has also been highly praised this summer to add to the wealth of talent in our reserve sides. If all these players live up to their promise then Wenger may give up buying any established stars in the future!
It’s hard to comment on players we seldom or have never seen. I wish with every young player there could be a short video posted on the signing and the players reaction because it is a big deal in a players career.
i think Platini was right to be scared of EPL dominating European football,
it has already started we are stealing players from Barca and Real where it was the other way around up until last year,
My concerns are that Man-U, City, and Chelsea will always pay higher then us, i believe Chelsea is waiting for the last mnt to see what United and Arsenal are after then they will asses and make a move with much better offer for a top striker once they know who is available
I love the name VLAD DRAGOMIR
Sounds scary
Vlad is the name of the fiction character Dracula based on Vlad the Impaler
“Vlad” reminds one of “Dracula” while “Dragomir” has a “dragon” ring to it. Really intimidating name actually.
yes the future looks bright, some real talent, was already excited about dan crowley, zelalem.
now in this window we have bought some real young prodigies who with our top notch development setup, will become great players.
but what about this season ?
anyone coming?
we are so close ….
please arsene hear our prayers
out of 10 probaby 1 or 2 will become good players and make it to the team….
but judging from the last 10 years….how many actually make it ????
i also feel the same. they shine as youngsters then we end up loaning them out or get sold for a low price…and all the effort to purchase and groom these players gets lost.
Would love to see them make it in the 1st team in EPL games…im sure if we have injuries to key players, instead of players like Flamini and Arteta we could give some of these youngsters a chance.
Zelalem , Crowley and Chuba Akpom look really good.
more then your Chelsea.
In truth a 1 in 10 hit rate is all that is probably planned for. If just one comes good and plays a prominent part in the 1st team for 5-10 years then the academy’s job is done.
I completely agree pal …
Think people forget that to make it at arsenal , for all of our shortcomings in recent years , youngsters still have to be good enough to play at champions league level !
If we were a mid table side , our success rate would be much higher , but if they can’t cut it at champs league level , they won’t be good enough for us and those prospects are few and far between !
We’ve developed tonnes of players that have steady premier league careers , just not quite top 4 material.
It’s highly important to find top young players.
We have better spending power then we use to but City, Chelsea and United have more. Also, prices are so high for top talent. Also the FFP rules Maybe loosened.
So in addition to signing top talented players, we need to grow them as well from Academy. For our future
Very nice.
Good t have for the future.
Now…for the present…..?
France has mostly been good to us over the decades
Wenger
Henry
Pires
Viera
Petit
Anelka
Clichy
Sagna
Wiltord
Flamini
Debuchy
Giroud
Koscielny
Coquelin
Squillaci, Silvestre 🙁 🙁
Probably missing some.
The new offside rules could lead to quite some goals being disallowed,if a player make shot at goal and his team-mate in an offside position makes a play to the ball even if he doesnt touched the ball the goal will be disallowed {player penalised}kind of if offside player action impacts on the opponent not able to play well.Offside kept man utd tightly in top4.Anyways I dont know how many times this rule will be explained to the ladies,
speaking of off-side, wtf was Ivanovic trying to do to Chech for Chelski free-kick…shame they actually had to resort to dirty tactics to try and get a goal..
Official-Chuba Akpom goes on loan to Hull Tigers. He needs it and he’s gunner come back with more experience. #COYG
he took punches from you lot for missing out on Zlatan, Messi, Ronaldo, Hazard, even Pele and Maradona and the likes…….so he’s making sure the future is so bright we may need sun glasses to watch those lads when they fully develop. good work Wenger.
Hey admin its unfair…why do u keep refusing to include my comments? Change ur ways
I foresee Jeff Adelaide holding down a spot in the 1st XI soonest…cuz that kid’s got mad skills
Now no one can ask me to believe whatever Wenger says, that man is more or less a Sociopath. Just a month ago he said “he (akpom) is staying, i plan to keep him with us”, he made it sound like Akpom will be Giroud’s backup but now loaned to Hull City…i wanna think Wenger is definitely getting a new CF, he’s just not talking about it…he never did anyway
All that ferocious names…….pray he turns out to be Tough……. Cuz it will be annoying if he don’t!
So he has to state clearly and honestly his every planned move so other teams can be well prepared? It’s the game within the game my friend …
The more I hate Chelsea, I must say I admire the way they are doing business. Last 2-3 years they have been buying hot prospects and sending them on loan, then selling them if they are not Chelsea grade(perhaps no one yet lol). Now that we have money, we are spending on youngsters. Each year if at least 1 player comes through to make it Arsenal grade, we will be much stronger to cope with players leaving of old age. Else anyway they are sold for a profit.