Mikel Arteta has confirmed that the club are investigating the possibility of sending Karl Hein on loan for the season ahead.
The 22-year-old was close to leaving the club as a free agent this summer but penned new terms on the proviso the club facilitates a move that allows him to gain much-needed experience of senior football.
Importantly, retaining Hein has meant Arteta has a senior keeper for pre-season while he waits for David Raya and Aaron Ramsdale to return from holiday.
Hein was between the sticks for Saturday’s 2-0 win over Leyton Orient at London Colney and was awarded the man of the match for his performance against Bournemouth in Los Angeles last night.
The Estonia international made two fine saves in normal time as the game finished 1-1 and then stopped two penalties as the Gunners overcame the Cherries 5-4 in a pre-arranged shootout.
“I’m very happy for him,” Arteta said in his post-game press conference.
“Obviously he had to be really patient and wait for his opportunity. He came back from his holidays really sharp and prepared; he knew that he had big games ahead of him and he started tonight, and I think he had a really good performance.”
Quizzed on the possibility of sending Hein out on loan, he continued: “That’s a conversation that we are having at the moment. Obviously, David and Aaron are away at the moment and we’re really short in the position.
“We want to develop our players, especially a player like Karl with a big potential and a big future ahead of him. He needs to play games, so we’re going to explore that option as well.”
It’s expected that Arsenal will recruit Dan Bentley from Wolves to take Hein’s spot as third-choice keeper and that a replacement for Aaron Ramsdale is also on the shopping list. Having already added Lucas Nygaard and Tommy Setford to the academy, it’s an unprecedented period of change between the sticks.
I also admit I had breakfast this morning. But wait I had the impression Setford was so highly regarded he’d basically be our third choice keeper now? Or is he still a year away from being a year away? Either way. The fact there doesn’t seem to be a bidding war over Ramsdale is insane to me, are so many teams that stupid? He’s a fantastic experienced international keeper, so good with such brilliant character that nobody other than Arteta saw the need to upgrade, and could’ve just as easily stayed Arsenal’s no. 1 keeper. If I were any mid… Read more »
I don’t know if this is tongue-in-cheek, but that there are no teams fighting it out for Ramsdale as you have stated is quite instructive. Why are teams not going for him if he is as good as some fans make him out to be.
Worrying.
The issues we face selling Ramsdale are his high wages and time left on his contract. I’m not sure any mid table prem team or another European team could afford to out right buy him.
Yeah, I think the word “confirmed” as in the text rather than the headline’s “admitted” was intended. But, I think Andrew was up pretty early and in a bit of a rush. I admit I don’t know this for sure.
That’s absolutely fair enough, I was by no means trying to joke at his expense though I admit I might have been poking fun a wee bit
Ramsdale is staying I reckon. Hopefully he’ll get enough cup games to keep himself in the window and if we’re lucky we’ll get 20m for him next summer
Aaron needs to leave but has no real incentive given his likely wages and length of contract. And no one will touch him because of that…what a waste for both club and player! We’ll need to admit yet another error on squad management and bite the bullet on paying off his remaining contract and let him move on. Having an England international on the bench all season would be ridiculous.
Could we not promote Hein to second choice and play him in the cups if Ramsdale leaves? I know that Bournemouth was just one friendly, but Hein’s an international goalkeeper. We could do a lot worse.