Arsenal have added seven more youth players to the Europa League squad, ahead of the Gunners’ first game against FC Köln tonight.

Arsenal youth expert Jeorge Bird reports that seven new players from the academy have been added to the squad for the competition. Julio Pleguezuelo, Jordi Osei-Tutu, Gedion Zelalem, Vlad Dragomir, Yassin Fortune, Emile Smith Rowe and Nathan Tormey have all been included.

Pleguezuelo trained with the first-team and will hope to be involved in tomorrow night’s opening group stage fixture at home to Cologne. It’s unknown if he will start, however. Zelalem has recently returned from a lengthy injury, but stands a chance of appearing from the bench, in my opinion.

As with the Premier League, you only have a limit on the number of senior players you can register. In the Europa League, you can register 25 senior players, eight of which must be homegrown – meaning that they spent three years with an English club between the ages of 15 and 21 – and a minimum of four of those eight must have spent three years at your club specifically.

After that, you can register as many youth players as you want, provided that they have played for your club for an uninterrupted period of two years since their 15th birthday. 16-year-olds can also be registered if they’ve spent the previous two years at the club. The complete set of regulations can be found on the UEFA website.