Mikel Arteta has suggested that Max Dowman could play in a new position in the future, but he’ll primarily be used on the right wing or as an attacking midfielder for now.
Max Dowman has played a couple of different positions for the Arsenal first-team so far, largely just reacting to whatever Mikel Arteta has needed from him.
That’s meant some time on the right-hand side, and some appearances in midfield as an alternative to Martin Odegaard.
But in light of Christos Tzolis’ injury, Arsenal’s current most pressing need is perhaps on the left, a position we haven’t seen Dowman play so far. Arteta was asked ahead of Tuesday’s match against Lille whether he might now consider the youngster for the opposite flank.
“We haven’t seen much of Max on the left, and I think especially the way we have involved him and trained him in those two positions (centrally or on the right), probably at the moment it’s easier (to play there),” Arteta responded.
“But with the talent that he has, if we need to throw him in a new position at some point. I think he will have the capacity to adapt to it.”
Recent Arsenal academy products have often ended up playing different positions from the ones that earned them their breakthrough in the younger age groups.
Right-winger Bukayo Saka was primarily a left-winger for the youth teams, Myles Lewis-Skelly was a youth midfielder but broke through as a first-team left-back, Ethan Nwaneri played centrally much more often with the u21s than the first team (in which he’s often been used on the right).
Even so, it’s rare for a player to play a position they’d never played for the youth teams. Saka, Lewis-Skelly, and Nwaneri all played at least some games for the u21s in their future first-team position, whereas Dowman has never really played on the left-wing.
For now, the 16-year-old is probably going to stay where he is. But if Arsenal pick up another couple of injuries before Tzolis returns, you never know what might happen.
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