Arsenal are once again open to letting Ainsley Maitland-Niles leave the club with four clubs said to be after his signature this month.

Ainsley Maitland-Niles was set to be let go from the club in the summer but Arsenal and Mikel Arteta made a U-turn and decided to keep the 23-year-old at the club.

This pleased fans who want to see Maitland-Niles do well at the club, but with just 13 starts this season, and just four full 90s in the league, it seems he’s set to leave before the window closes on Monday night.

Four clubs are now said to be interested in signing Maitland-Niles.

We covered West Brom’s interest, along with an unnamed current top four side here and now the Daily Mail are reporting that Southampton and Newcastle are also interested.

As it says in the article above from Saturday’s Daily Mail, Southampton are believed to be Arsenal’s preference for the player which isn’t hard to understand. Newcastle are in a mess and, well, who would you pick to send a player to, Ralph Hasenhuttl or Sam Allardyce?

Sam Dean and Luke Edwards, however, report that Newcastle have made contact with Arsenal in the last 48 hours and that Steve Bruce is ‘hopeful’ that a deal can be found.

Maitland-Niles is under contract with Arsenal until 2023 and is currently valued at around £16.2m.

You can see how much he earns here.