Arsenal willing to consider Max Dowman loan after Ipswich brace
Max Dowman scored twice as Arsenal beat Ipswich 4-2 in the Carabao Cup at Ipswich on Tuesday, and the club say they could permit the 16-year-old to go out on loan this season if it would aid his development. Manager Mikel Arteta stressed he wants Dowman involved with the senior squad but said the club will regularly assess what is best for the teenager.
Dowman is the youngest player to ever start a game for Arsenal and last season the 16-year-old set two records, as the youngest player to score in Premier League history and for the Gunners. He completed his GCSEs in the summer and will be eligible to make a loan move when he turns 17 on 31 December, with the winter transfer window scheduled to open the following day.
Although he has yet to play in the Premier League this term, Dowman marked his first appearance of the season with two goals in Tuesday's Carabao Cup win. He featured 13 times for Arsenal last term as they ended their 22-year wait to win the Premier League.
On the prospect of loan moves, Arteta said: "We will evaluate every six months where we are and what is the best thing for him to do and then make the right decision." He added: "It depends on a lot of factors. What he needs, and what the team needs as well, the availability we have in the squad, the minutes that he is playing and the qualities of those minutes. We have to be open, but now the focus is to be here and to impact the team."
Arteta said the club had been clear about wanting Dowman in the first-team group through pre-season and early campaign, adding: "We haven't really listened to any of the possibilities because we were crystal clear that we wanted to have Max in the squad, that we wanted him to be part of the pre-season and then start to see where we are from there." Reports have suggested League One side Luton's manager Jack Wilshere, the former Arsenal midfielder, has expressed interest in taking the youngster on loan.
When asked whether it might be too early to loan Dowman, Arteta reiterated caution and referenced his own early move overseas: "There have been many cases of that age when they have gone out and been successful and others not. In my particular case, I was 17 when I went to Paris [St-Germain]. It depends on the atmosphere that you find there, and how much the coach believes in you as to whether you go there just to be part of a squad or play minutes. Which country, it depends. But now he is in a good place, let's keep him here."
Arsenal began the season by beating Manchester City in the Community Shield and have won all seven of their domestic and European fixtures so far this term. On whether Dowman's Carabao Cup display could influence Premier League selection, Arteta said: "The best way to knock on the door is to do it on the pitch, not in the office. Then you just leave out the arguments. When a player delivers constantly on the pitch, every single day in training, that's the best way, that's the best signal for the manager. That's the best signal for his team-mates, too. And what Max did the other day, alongside all the other players as well that haven't played many minutes this season, was really impressive."
Dowman will hope his two-goal performance has put him into Arteta's thinking for Saturday's Premier League trip to Brighton.
