Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta has revealed his future plans for Gabriel Martinelli ahead of their postponed clash with Manchester City.
The Gunners signed the youngster from Brazilian side Ituano last summer for a fee of around £6million.
Martinelli has hit the ground running in his debut season and so far has scored 10 goals and provided four assists in 26 appearances in all competitions.
However, a large number of those games he has played on the left-wing, despite his main position being a central striker.
But Arteta doesn’t plan on that being the case in the long-term as, according to the Metro, the Arsenal manager is planning on using the 18-year-old as a centre forward in the future.
Martinelli, like Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, is a centre-forward but has often been asked to play on the left-wing to accommodate others.
However, while Arteta explained that while players are having to play out of position due to imbalances in his squad, he does see Martinelli playing centrally in the future.
“[Aubameyang and Martinelli] are centre forwards but with the squad balance that we have at the moment, to play on those positions on the left we don’t have five players,” said Arteta.
“We are using one left-winger to play as a left-back [Saka] and he is not a left-back so we’re just trying to adapt to the situation that we have today, trying to create an amount of goal threat that can be successful for the team.
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“That’s part of managing the players that we have.”
This article was most recently revised and updated 5 years ago