Arsenal are looking for a new defender in January, with Abdou Diallo and Ohis Felix Uduokhai both being scouted by new Head of Recruitment Sven Mislintat.

The Daily Mail write that the Gunners are looking for a replacement for Per Mertesacker, and Mislintat has recommended the Bundesliga pair.

Diallo, 21, currently plays for Mainz, having joined from Monaco in the summer. The Frenchman has consistently been in the starting eleven since then, only missing two games through injury, and he’s even added a couple of goals as well.

Considering he only moved to Germany recently, it might be too soon to convince him to move on again, however.

It’s a similar story with 20-year-old Uduokhai, who also just moved to his current club in the summer. The Germany u20 international joined Wolfsburg from the second tier of German football, and has since become a regular for his new team.

Signing young promising players to replace those that are moving on is something Arsenal fans were most excited about when Mislintat was hired.

With Mertesacker’s new role as Head of the Academy starting next season, and Shkodran Mustafi and Laurent Koscielny’s injury problems, the club don’t have many defenders they can rely on at the moment.

I’m not entirely convinced that the Gunners will be looking at signing young players, considering Calum Chambers’ new contract and Rob Holding only joining last summer, but we’ll see how things pan out.