Mikel Arteta has told the London Evening Standard that things are getting ‘better and better’ for William Saliba at Arsenal.
Saliba moved to Arsenal this summer and there was great excitement about his arrival at the Emirates Stadium.
However, the youngster has failed to make a big impact yet and was left out of Arsenal’s Europa League squad.
That means that he cannot feature this evening against Dundalk, even with Arsenal’s options in central defence limited.
And Arteta admits that he feels sorry for the 19-year-old now, even though he feels that there have been positive signs in recent weeks.
“He’s in a much better place,” he said. “He’s feeling a lot more confident around the place, his language is improving and he’s starting to understand much better what we’re doing physically.
“He’s played a few games, with the Under-23s, which he needed because he didn’t play any football in the last seven or eight months. Things are progressively getting better and better.
“I feel really bad for William Saliba. Because we had so many central defenders we decided to leave him out of the [Europa League] squad, which was really hurtful for me to do.”
Arteta’s comments may suggest that Saliba is gradually pushing towards getting a chance to play in the Premier League.
Arsenal have hardly looked rock solid in their opening few matches this term, so testing Saliba could be a viable option in the next few weeks.
The Gunners are currently without Rob Holding, Calum Chambers, Pablo Mari and now David Luiz, so they are really down to the bare bones in central defence.
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