Owen Hargreaves has tipped Arsenal to loan out some of their talented young stars when speaking on BT Sport’s coverage of Arsenal vs Molde (5/11/20 8PM kick-off time).
The pundit was discussing the performances of Ainsley Maitland-Niles, Joe Willock and Eddie Nketiah against the Swedish outfit, and the lack of opportunities they’ve gotten in the league this season.
Hargreaves pointed towards his former club Bayern Munich as a good model to follow with the Bavarians making the most of the loan system, and he tipped Arsenal to do something similar with their young talents.
“It might not be at Arsenal right now,” Hargreaves said when asked about the young trio’s first-team chances.
“Saka has forced his way in because he’s been absolutely magnificent, but the problem is in a big team like this, we saw this with Jadon Sancho at Manchester City, it’s hard to get games there.
“Even for Phil Foden, as good as he is, he had to work around De Bruyne and David Silva last season, and Gundogan and Bernardo Silva. These young kids in these huge teams, it’s hard.
“I think back to Philip Lahm and Toni Kroos and David Alaba, they went on two year loans from Bayern Munich. They went on two year loans and played football at Hoffenheim, at Stuttgart, at Leverkusen, to get those reps.
“Play European football with big teams in the Bundesliga and come back and then walk into the Bayern Munich team.
“You might see that from these kids, because right now it feels like they could play more, but the opportunities aren’t there because Arsenal have a world class team.”
Hargreaves is bang on the money here.
The Gunners have a promising crop of talent coming through, but Mikel Arteta seems to be struggling to juggle the responsibilities of handing out opportunities while remaining competitive.
Yes, the Europa League is a chance for these players to get chances, but that’s not really enough at these vital stages of their careers.
Perhaps season-long loan spells elsewhere are the way forward for Arsenal, but if they are to utilise that system, they need to be much more diligent than they have been in the past.
Just look at Nketiah’s loan to Leeds last year.
The Gunners cut that deal short due to a lack of minutes, but they should have seen something like that coming a mile off and sent him somewhere he was guaranteed to get a game.
Arteta may want to heed Hargreaves’ advice going forward.
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