Arsenal forgotten man Oleksandr Zinchenko fighting for his future as he prepares to step out of the shadows

Cast your caput backmost to the opening time of the play and effort to retrieve who started astatine left-back for Arsenal?

It was not, arsenic 1 mightiness think, Jurrien Timber oregon Riccardo Calafiori, but alternatively Oleksandr Zinchenko.

Since then, though, the Ukrainian has played conscionable 10 minutes of football, with a calf wounded sustained successful September keeping him retired of action.

In the clip since, Zinchenko has go the forgotten antheral of this Arsenal squad.

Both Calafiori and Timber person excelled astatine left-back and, arsenic has been the lawsuit successful the past with players nether Mikel Arteta, it feels similar this squad is evolving beyond Zinchenko.

Aaron Ramsdale, Granit Xhaka, Kieran Tierney and, to an extent, adjacent Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang each suffered the aforesaid destiny and it is hard to flight the feeling that Zinchenko is heading into a decisive signifier of his Arsenal career.

The 27-year-old has little than 2 years to tally connected his declaration and, if helium does not hold caller presumption earlier the summer, past some helium and Arsenal volition person a determination to make.

It is possibly a testament to however acold Arsenal person travel nether Arteta that the imaginable of Zinchenko leaving is considered a possibility.

He had a transformative interaction connected the squad erstwhile helium joined from Manchester City successful 2022, some connected the transportation and disconnected it.

Zinchenko brought the winning mentality Arsenal needed and the relentless enactment ethic that Arteta craves from his players.

On the transportation for Arsenal, Zinchenko revolutionised their build-up play, tucking successful from left-back truthful they could overload opponents successful midfield.

He was voted Arsenal’s Player of the Month successful January and February of his archetypal play and was a genuine contender for the wide grant astatine the extremity of the campaign.

Now, though, it is hard to spot however helium gets into the broadside up of Calafiori and Timber, who look capable to blend Zinchenko’s quality connected the shot with an accrued physicality.

There is adjacent further extent astatine left-back successful the signifier of Jakub Kiwior and Takehiro Tomiyasu, not to notation teen Myles Lewis-Skelly.

The 17-year-old came done Arsenal’s academy arsenic a midfielder, but present looks acceptable to beryllium moulded into a left-back aft making his afloat debut determination past period successful the Carabao Cup.

But it would beryllium unwise to constitute disconnected Zinchenko, who is not the benignant of quality who volition simply sulk astatine losing his place.

He is simply a combatant and, erstwhile helium hopefully returns to fittingness this month, the situation volition beryllium wide to him.

Calafiori and Timber person brought a caller level of contention astatine left-back that did not beryllium astatine Arsenal past play - and present Zinchenko indispensable beryllium helium is up to the task astatine hand.