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Mikel Arteta issues essential warning for Arsenal’s top prospects to avoid past mistakes

Arsenal are a club draped in the tradition of blooding young academy prospects into the first team. From Charlie George in the late 1960s, Tony Adams, David Rocastle and co. in the ’80s, to the current crop of talent bursting out of Hale End.

Bukayo Saka stands as the player leading the charge for the current group of youngsters as his performances in a variety of positions continue to catch the eye, but he isn’t the only young gun impressing.

Eddie Nketiah’s goal at Southampton continued to prove why he’s so valued by Mikel Arteta, Reiss Nelson keeps knocking on the first team door, whereas Emile Smith Rowe has been exceptional on his loan spell at Huddersfield Town.

Arteta sticking to this tradition of trusting the club’s own youngsters has paid dividends in the way their performances have paid him back but the Spaniard admitted he is weary of playing them too much too soon.

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“I have a lot of faith on all the young talent we have at the football club but we need the right stability and foundations around them to make sure they develop in right way, at the right moment, with the right amount of pressure behind them,” Arteta told reporters on Friday [June 26].

“In order to do that, it’s a process. If you speed up that process, you risk burning them [out] and we cannot do that. We have some really young players who are playing more football than they probably should be but they are showing great maturity and personality to play in difficult moments which is great for their experience.

“But we need the other players to support them in the right way and that’s what we are trying to achieve, this balance to be very competitive but excited about the future ahead of us.”

So far this season, Saka – arguably Arsenal’s player of the season – has played 32 games for the club. Joe Willock has 35 appearances to his name, Gabriel Martinelli’s season will end on 26 games, Ainsley Maitland-Niles has featured 25 times, Nelson 19 and Nketiah has played 11 times since returning from Leeds United.

There’s no question that each of them has deserved their minutes and will benefit as a result of getting more genuine experiences of professional football, but relying on exceptionally talented youngsters has cost Arsenal before.

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Over the course of his true breakout season [2010/11], Jack Wilshere played 54 times for club and country. Just 18 [and 19 beyond January 1] at the time, playing so frequently later admitted in Arsenal’s In Lockdown podcast that it could have had an impact on the way his career panned out.

Managing the youngsters’ respective journeys after breaking into the first team will be incredibly important for Arteta but the current issue is not only that some are outplaying the senior members of the squad, but having to do so very often with the packed post-lockdown schedule.

With five games in the first 15 days of July, heavy rotation may be needed and that could see Under-23s players who have been training with the side like Matt Smith, Zech Medley and Harry Clarke come into the fold. What is encouraging, however, is that Arteta has taken notice of the issues that have held back youngsters in the past and wants to ensure those mistakes are avoided.

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