Ainsley Maitland-Niles provided Arsenal fans a glimpse into the future after starring against Reading in EFL Cup win
Youngster may be rough around the edges but has clearly learnt from his year on loan at Ipswich Town
ALEX OXLADE-CHAMBERLAIN stole the show with two goals, but Ainsley Maitland-Niles provided a glimpse of Arsenal’s future on Tuesday night.
The 19-year-old was handed only his second start for the club during the 2-0 EFL Cup victory over Reading.
Midfielder Maitland-Niles, who exclusively revealed how Mesut Ozil is mentoring him to SunSport earlier this month, certainly showed no fear on his full home debut against the Royals.
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By no means was it a man of the match display by the Gooner – his overconfidence leading to him giving the ball away on more than one occasion in the first half – but he showed flashes of why he is so
highly-rated.
As he has proved on numerous occasions at youth level, most recently for England Under-20s against Brazil earlier in the season, he can produce the goods when it comes to spectacular strikes.
And boy did he try to replicate that in this cup tie. His first effort came on 19 minutes.
Oxlade-Chamberlain’s cross from the right was deflected into the path off 25 yards from goal. He took
a touch to compose himself before curling a delicious side-footer inches wide of the post.
14 minutes later he was at it again.
This time cutting out a defender’s pass 30 yards from goal, driving forward as he jinked one way and then the other, but he sent his effort whizzing over the bar from the 18 yard line.
Not to be deterred, and seemingly unfazed, Maitland-Niles was to pull the trigger one more time before the break – this time blazing over after goalkeeper Ali Al-Habsi had punched a corner clear.
“Everyone wants to score, so I tried a few times,” Maitland-Niles told Arsenal’s website afterwards.
“I wasn’t too far off with some of them, some of them were a bit wayward. I’m just full of confidence right now.
“I was nervous at first, but I just got on with the game and tried to do what I do best.”
Usually a holding midfielder, the new attacking threat the ace is showing has transpired from last season’s spell away from the Emirates… At least that’s Arsene Wenger’s reasoning.
In his programme notes, Wenger said: “Since he’s come back from Ipswich, he seems more confident and more of an extrovert. He was a bit shy, a bit timid before.
“His experience in a dressing room of adults helps make you a man, and he came back with much more strength in his belief.
“That is an important quality because when you are in a dressing room you have to be able to say ‘hello my friends, I am here and I believe I am a good player’.”
Although still in his teens, Maitland-Niles is experienced in a number of positions.
He started at right-back in the last round at Nottingham Forest and was deployed as a winger during his time at Ipswich.
But if midfield is where Wenger envisages Maitland-Niles forging out a career for himself, then he does not fit into the Frenchman’s Wenger mould.
“He hasn’t got an imposing frame,” admitted Wenger. “But he’s mobile, he’s quick and he’s sharp technically. He has a good eye, he can win the ball and he has the speed to fly into people and get the ball out of their feet, and that’s a very interesting quality that you do not find often.”
Wenger added: “Ainsley is a versatile option because he was right-back in the last round, but he’s also played in central midfield for the youth team and on the wing at Ipswich last season.
“The most suited position to his qualities is something that is vital and important. He has done extremely well at Nottingham Forest as a right-back, but maybe his best position is a central defensive
midfielder at the moment.”
A starting place in Wenger’s Premier League starting XI on a regular basis may just be a step too far for the starlet at present.
But with a quarter-final to look forward to next month, and the FA Cup beginning after the turn of the year, Maitland-Niles will still have plenty of opportunities to impress and continue his development into a first-team regular for the Gunners.