Reports last night indicated that Arsenal rejected a £5 million bid from Brentford for Folarin Balogun, with AC Milan also showing interest in the hugely talented young striker.
Balogun has frequently impressed for Arsenal at youth level, finding the net with regularity for the U18s and the U23s, while earlier this season he was involved with the first-team for the first time as he was an unused substitute in the Carabao Cup victory against Nottingham Forest.
Arsenal are determined to keep hold of Balogun, with the 18-year-old possessing immense potential.
If Balogun was to remain with Arsenal it would be interesting to see what lies in store for him next season, with a loan spell a possibility.
In the long term there is likely to be much competition for Balogun as he attempts to make the breakthrough, with Eddie Nketiah and Tyreece John-Jules also determined to succeed at the club.
There is certainly a case, though, to suggest that Balogun has the most potential out of all three, with his all-round game of a very high standard.It is inevitable that Arsenal will lose some top young talents along the way, with some prospects unwilling to wait for their chance to impress for the first-team.
With Balogun, however, Arsenal must do all that they can to keep him as if he was to leave there is a good chance they would regret his departure.
—
Jeorge Bird is the author of www.arsenalyouth.wordpress.com Follow him on Twitter @jeorgebird
This guy is the most talented player to come out of Arsenal’s academy in decades.
Do NOT sell him. We’ll regret it forever
And with a name like that, it’s just a no brainer… common, he’s not Balobrent or Balomil… he’s BaloGUN !!
I love what I am hearing about Balogun.
I pray he should fulfill potentials
I remember “loving what I was hearing” about Jay Simpson and Benik Afobe. I remember praying that Benik wasn’t poached by Barca.
Time will tell, but don’t hold your breath.
And Aneke, JET, Akpom, although akpom is looking quite good now.
We gotta keep him. So much potential.
Then all we need do is play him. If we involve him in matches like City do with Foden, he’ll most likely want to stay. Had Martinelli come from our academy, he’ll probably be playing U23 now. About time we adopted the Ajax model; if he’s good enough, he’s old enough
wasnt he injured recently. This might be the reason behind the lack of playtime.
Man, we really have some amazing promising talents at this club. People have always spoken about Arsene’s legacy and I think the fact that our academy is producing that amount of top youngsters at the moment is probably an even bigger achievement from him than the titles he has won us. He really implemented a philosophy within this club and with guys like Edu, Arteta, Freddie and Per around in the future I’m pretty sure they will follow that philosophy in the coming years and continue to make Arsene’s principles the Arsenal priciples. I think his influence on Arsenal has… Read more »
Excellent comment.
But, don’t you know, its de rigueur to criticize le Boss, so let’s have no more of these objective, insightful comments.
🙂
This young player will be playing regular top class football within a year and his development will skyrocket if he was with Brentford. They have one of the best player development set-ups in the country with a direct path to first team football and with Brentford if you are good enough, you are old enough. Mbeumo is only 20 and is a leading part of the BMW attack as is Josh D’Silva also only a young player who would be playing under 23 football if he was with Arsenal.
Not the main point of this story, but Brentford and Milan chasing the same signature?
Gazidis. Dontcha know?
Fuck Gazidis. Fuck him with a tyrannosaurus leg bone, that cunt.
Kids home from school then.
“Then all we need to do is play him.”
How though? Drop Auba? Give him Nketiah’s spot on the bench? Switch to a 4-4-2 diamond system which uses more strikers at the expense of wingers? Flat 4-4-2 at the expense of a No. 10?
On current form I’d drop Laca for a few games to let Martinelli play on the left and Auba centrally.
Agree with this, Laca has been Lacaluster in the last 9 games.
I’ll see myself out.
Lacazette is brilliant, and his contribution goes way beyond goals.
It looks like he’s being asked to drop deeper, and have the wide players attack the space behind him.
Precisely, lacazette works for the team. It’s wonderful to see him do that even though he’s on a barren run, he always does what’s best for the team, drop back, commit shit house fouls, find great passes. Would be really unfair to bench him. And let’s not do an iwobi on martinelli, benching established players for 18 year olds could get in their heads, who’s to know. A few games on the bench when auba is fit will only have him working harder to start more games of course. But golly, isn’t the lad a joy to watch.
Playing devils advocate but if he’s that good , wouldn’t we be seeing him pushing for a place in the 1st team with Martinelli who is also 18?
Dont get me wrong, I love our academy players but sometimes the path is just too congested
Well if Auba and/or Laca leave in the next 6 months then that pathway becomes quite a lot clearer. It would seem like poor timing to let him go now without the senior pair being tied down to new contracts.
Personally I wouldn’t be that averse to letting one of them go if it is for a good fee, even in this transfer window
I’d let laca and nketia go end of season, promote balogun, solidify martinelli. Think Laca is playing well currently but tbh ever since we left the Giroud idea behind we’ve struggled with our 1 touch passing around the box, the auba laca neither want to winger has always been a problem.
Oh and John-Jules will be a.good option too
And lets sell balogun next season when there’s a little hype around another teenager yeah?
He’s younger, only his 1st season with the u23s, simply a season behind Saka.
We’ve lost a lot of good talent from Academy recently and this even after Wenger and Dick Law relinquished their roles in transfers. Gnabry of course was a HUGE mistake. But recently we also lost Mallen and Bennacer both doing good. Let alone go course Harry Kane but that was some time ago. Currently we have plenty of bright attacking young talents. Nketiah is still on the verge, John-Jules looks a real prospect particularly with his frame. Balogun also in contention. They’re still young but there is a sense of impatience these days particularly when they see players like Sancho… Read more »
Kane was a schoolboy with us. He left well before the age to sign a professional contract. And being reliant on Saka is allowing him to show his worth. Hes a winger playing at left back and doing a fucking great job.
Yes. If Saka continues to develop at left back we sure don’t need any replacements from France, and he may just supplant some other present roster players.
and let’s be clear, Saka is playing LB because he has to. When he made his breakthrough in Europa, I don’t remember saying, “he’s not bad on the wing, but I’d bet he’d kill it as a left back”….Not quite by design he’s a left sided AMN. Both players are just playing there to keep first team minutes, but think both would prefer to be on the wings.
Im loving the noises coming out of the academy.
Good problem to have, all this talent in the academy
Remember earlier in the season he was banging in goals for fun. He was there on the score sheet everytime. When does his contract end?
He is BaloGUN. Meaning he is a Gunner for life. He has a Gunners DNA in his Name and Blood. Let no man even try or think of salling a Powerful Gunner by Birth.
If Jorge rates him above the others why is he not playing?
We’ll see how this goes, but hopefully we’ll