Mikel Arteta doesn’t play youngsters much. Should we care?

Dissecting Arteta’s relationship with academy players

I wish I had a quarter for every time — even just in the last week — I saw or heard someone advocate for Reuell Walters, or Ethan Nwaneri, or Myles Lewis-Skelly, or Lino Sousa (or all of them) to get into the match day 6 game at PSV, essentially a meaningless dead rubber that wouldn’t change Arsenal’s fortunes either way.

We of course know now that none of them played, not even off the bench, as Arteta opted instead to use his starting XI to get names like Cedric and Elneny some run, and then kept his starters warm with his five subs.

Since that occurrence, there has certainly been some uproar. Some were dumbstruck by the “risk” of using someone like Gabriel Jesus for five minutes. Others thought it sent the wrong signal to the youth to not give Walters or Nwaneri a run, and feared this may signal the lack of a path into the team.

The use of Declan Rice as a Saliba replacement seemed to ruffle some feathers. Arteta explained himself after the game, admitting it was a trial for what could become an actual experience move if push comes to shove.

So, what’s the deal here? Is Arteta simply another anti-youth manager who cares not for the Arsenal legacy of promoting youth? Let’s get into it.

Minutes and their utility

The first point I think needs to be examined is that while he faces accusation of freezing kids out, Arteta also is consistently berated for not using his bench enough, particularly when it comes to names like Nelson, Kiwior, Smith Rowe and Vieira. Given the chance to utilize some free minutes this week, doesn’t it make perfect sense that these are the players he’s called upon?

Going down a similar path here: Why wouldn’t Arteta use these minutes to prove out players he’d actually call on this season, if needed? No, Cedric playing right back would not be a good situation. But if Walters, whose performances in training will be very familiar to Arteta, genuinely isn’t in that frame, what good does playing him in this game do?

It certainly would be more fun, but that’s not the job at hand here. Just as Carlo Ancelotti called on Dani Ceballos and Nacho Fernandez, guys who may actually factor into Real Madrid’s title race, Arteta called upon his backups.

And given there’s no risk of overrunning his starters with five days until his next game, there’s little harm outside of the standard risk of injury in giving them a short runout rather than an intensive warm down at game’s end.

For what it’s worth: it really sucked that ESR, Vieira and Tomiyasu weren’t fit enough to start. They all would have.

What’s an academy for?

In discussing the topic of an academy over the past several days, I’ve also landed in a number of discussions on this question. There certainly exists some pervasive ideal of an academy feeding the big club a happy portion of its major players, despite that not typically being the case for monstrously successful clubs.

I think that’s an idea where Arteta and the current club leadership diverges from many supporters: Sure, the academy is important and worthy of investment. That’s been demonstrated over the past few years. But it also exists to serve the first team, not the other way around.

The fact that Mikel Arteta has bought some players — something every big club does — rather than dole out experimental minutes to teenagers isn’t a red flag. Why would any club wanting to make a return to the Champions League play Charlie Patino when its ownership is willing to buy Declan Rice? Controversial as it will be to say, the same is true of Kai Havertz. Even boundless potential, until proven, is just potential. If you don’t believe it, ask any Chelsea fan.

Arteta has said young players will get chances when they’re ready, is it not possible he simply doesn’t think an away Champions League night wasn’t the right place? He said as much after the game. And it may just be that simple.

This isn’t Emery’s Arsenal

And guess what? That’s a great thing! Emery’s Arsenal played in the Europa League, and that’s where kids like Bukayo Saka got their big breaks.

It’s also not Arteta’s early Arsenal, which gave minutes to the likes of Willock and Balogun and a younger Nketiah in that same competition.

This Arsenal is in the Champions League, as one of the favorites to win. And in the Premier League title hunt. There are promising players and consistent contributors on the bench as a result, and they’re going to gobble up minutes that someone like Patino may have gotten in 2019. That’s life.

Arteta has developed players

While we’re on the subject of Emery, can we talk about the credit he gets for Saka, Smith Rowe and Martinelli?

I don’t know that it’s particularly widespread, but there’s at least a hive of fans who believe Emery made these three players regulars, but that’s not so.

Yes, he gave players their debut, but that doesn’t make him responsible for their talent or their growth.

Importantly, none of these players were even actual regulars under Emery. In his 18 months at the club, Martinelli made a grand total of 10 appearances (five of these came off the bench in the Premier League.)

Who gave Martinelli his first start in the league, and then another five after that? Mikel Arteta.

On Saka: he made his debut in Ukraine in the Europa League, and followed that by starting the next EL game against Qarabag. He played 13 minutes off the bench for what remained of that season.

Emery followed that by giving Saka 11 appearances total — 4 Premier League starts — before losing his gig. He made his other 15 PL starts after Emery was gone.

ESR made the fewest Emery-era appearances of the group, with 9 total in his stead, all in cups.

These aren’t exactly the establish regulars some would have you think, and they’ve all grown visibly during Arteta’s time in charge. That he wasn’t the boss when they debuted is irrelevant.

Who’s been left out?

Naturally, I can’t help but feel that a manager who’s actively freezing out young players, after four years, would have some bodies in his wake. Is that the case for Arteta?

The most famous example is Omari Hutchinson, who never had his name called under Arteta before bolting to Chelsea, where he’s currently on loan to Ipswich Town.

As I review what’s left of outgoing youth players over the last four years, here’s what I can come up with:

-Marcelo Flores is now in the Mexican league

-Zach Awe is in a championship club’s academy

-Matt Smith isn’t a nailed-on starter for Wigan

-Ben Cottrell is in the Slovenian league

-Catalin Cirjan is in the Romanian league

-Zach Medley is at Oostende

-Dan Ballard, possibly one of the biggest success stories, is a starter for Sunderland.

I don’t know that this list contains a lot of Premier League talent, and it brings me no joy to write that.

Folarin Balogun, of course, is at Monaco. His case will certainly be one to be debated. But he also generated good revenue for Arsenal in his sale, which was motivated at least part by the player himself, so even a good career would benefit Arsenal in several ways.

Patino will be the other one debated, should he not return to the club. We will definitely be keeping an eye on that, and evaluating Arsenal’s moves along the way. But it’s worth noting Arteta did give him his debut.

Meanwhile, the two players who have cause the most worry are Lewis-Skelly and Nwaneri, both of whom re-signed after being chased by a Murderer’s Row of English clubs for their first professional contracts.

What’s in a debut?

That brings me to what I’m planning to make my final point: Is Arteta risking losing these kids by not debuting them?

It’s been stated that giving these debuts provides a glimpse at what could be if youth players stay at London Colney and keep working hard (I guess Saka isn’t enough there, nor are Nketiah and Nelson making 100k per week and playing in the Champions Lwague, but I digress). So is giving those debuts really beneficial?

Of course, every player is different, and it’s impossible to tell exactly why someone leaves or stays. But I looked around a bit to see how other clubs have done it and whether it seems to help. Here’s what I found:

Pep Guardiola has given debuts to at least 25 players in his time at Manchester City (about seven years).

Phil Foden and Rico Lewis are of course the most noteworthy. Outside of Oscar Bobb, they’re also the only ones in the current senior setup. Ben Knight is still in the academy, while James McAtee is on loan at Sheffield United and Liam Delap at Hull City.

The list is otherwise littered with players who moved on, like Brahim Diaz, Cole Palmer, Pablo Maffeo and the Nmechas, among others. Did they benefit from making a debut at City? Did Roméo Lavia?

It’s similar under Jurgen Klopp, who’s debuted at least 17 players in about eight years of leading Liverpool.

The greatest of these has been Trent Alexander-Arnold. Klopp also gave debuts to Harvey Elliott and Curtis Jones, but when Liverpool’s midfield needed help this summer, he didn’t prioritize using those players over roughly £125m in spending to bring in Szoboszlai, Mac Allister and Gravenberch.

Many others at Liverpool have (somewhat famously) gone down a more Balogun-esque path. There’s Dominic Solanke, the Williamses Rhys and Neco, Ovie Ejaria. There are a couple still in the system, most notably Jarrell Quansah and Stefan Bajcetic, who’ve gotten minutes largely due to a rash of injuries. Ben Doak, probably their hottest commodity at the moment, has two Europa league starts and 37 PL minutes to his name.

Have Pep and Klopp’s more liberal approach to debuts made a big impact on their clubs? For Liverpool, it’s more accurate to say their fans wanted CB cover ahead of Quansah. And while Pep did his Pep thing and spoke fondly of Palmer this summer, they still sold him, and to a rival.

I could of course also cite Chelsea here, whose track record includes longtime contributes and/or stars like Reece James and Mason Mount, but also counts instant sales like Marc Guehi, Tino Livramento and Lewis Cook among its alums.

But, of course, none of those clubs is Arsenal.

As Arsenal becomes stronger, it’s only going to get more difficult for younger players to break through. That doesn’t mean they won’t get their chance, or that at age 18 an un-debuted player should consider his Gunners career dead. But it might mean fewer debuts, at least as long as there aren’t players truly knocking on the door (and I’m not sure there’s really anyone *that* close right now).

Frankly, from where I’m sitting, I’d prefer it that way. Because if the options are so poor that trying a teenager is among the most attractive, that’s probably a bad sign. And if it’s not a bad sign, it’s because the kid in question is really, really good.