Former Arsenal defender Martin Keown has stated that he is worried if Rob Holding will be put under too much pressure this season.
Speaking to FourFourTwo, former Arsenal defender Martin Keown has suggested that young central defender Rob Holding should only be slowly integrated into the Arsenal first team.
Arsenal completed the signing of Rob Holding from Bolton Wanderers this summer for a fee of around £2.5 million and many felt that manager Arsene Wenger made a move for the young defender with the future in mind.
However, injuries to first team regulars Gabriel Paulista and Per Mertesacker meant that Holding featured prominently during pre-season and also started at centre-back for the first few Premier League matches of the current campaign for Arsenal.
Holding most certainly held his own whenever he featured and considering his mature performances, the 20-year-old could be ready for first team football at the Emirates Stadium sooner than many anticipated.
Former Arsenal star Martin Keown has now gone on to state that he has been impressed by what he has seen of Holding so far but the 50-year-old is a bit worried for the youngster.
Keown stated that central defenders have very little room for error and he is concerned that Holding could well find himself under a lot of pressure if things start to go wrong.
Speaking to FourFourTwo, Keown explained, “Holding looks like a good acquisition because they’ve only paid £2.5m for him and he looks solid.
“But I just feel that when you’re a central defender in that position, it’s like goalkeepers – do we play young goalkeepers, do we play young central defenders? As soon as it goes wrong there’s suddenly a lot of pressure being put on those individuals.
“Holding handled it well in the first match, thrown in at the deep end. You expect Calum Chambers to have coped better because he’d been around longer, and maybe that’s why they’ve shipped him out. Maybe they feel he hasn’t developed.”
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