The £22m signing who could transform how Arsenal play football

A report from The Daily Telegraph which claimed that Arsenal are interested in Feyenoord left-back Quilindschy Hartman is premature in many ways – not least because he is recovering from a serious knee injury and will miss pre-season – but it may well be the case that he is a genuine long-term target in a position which can be viewed as something of a problem right now. So would the young Dutchman be an upgrade over the current options available to Mikel Arteta, and what would signing him tell us about Arsenal’s tactical direction?

As it stands, Arsenal have three players who can fill the role (excluding Kieran Tierney, who spent last season away on loan at Real Sociedad) and none quite seem to line up with what Arteta wants from his full-back. Hartman is young at 22 and has only been playing senior football for two seasons, but he could be the blueprint when Arsenal do decide to make a change.

Oleksandr Zinchenko offers control and consistency but isn’t a strong attacking option down the left flank and lost his place halfway through last season. Takehiro Tomiyasu is a fine player but naturally right-footed and also struggles to provide width down a left side which was the weakness in Arsenal’s otherwise excellent attacking unit. Jakub Kiwior is a good all-round player but is error-prone and doesn’t always read the game as easily as he might.

In looking at Hartman, Arsenal would be signalling a shift in priority – a move away from an inverted left-back who plays a supporting role and towards a defender who can play as a more orthodox wing-back, getting upfield to provide overlaps and crosses into the box. Capped four times by the Netherlands already (with a goal against France to his name), Hartman would fit that mould and suggest a sea change in the way Arteta wants to play. If the Spaniard saw the inverted full-back as the ideal long-term model, the Feyenoord man would not be on his shortlist.

At the start of last season, Arsenal’s tactical set-up employed Zinchenko as the starter and asked him to play a hybrid role between full-back and midfield, drifting in to support Declan Rice when Arsenal were in possession, a similar idea to that employed by Pep Guardiola in bringing John Stones up from defence last season. That was partially abandoned in the New Year, however, with a double pivot employed instead, meaning that the left-back began to stay wider, which is where Kiwior and Tomiyasu came in instead. But the former has not yet fully convinced and the latter is more suited to life on the right side.

Arsenal didn’t try to employ a truly aggressive wing-back at any point last season but if they’re scouting Hartman, it implies that they want to – not that Hartman is purely an attacking player by any means. A remarkably well-rounded prospect for one in the early stages of his career, Hartman has plenty of defensive quality as well.

The chart above shows us how he stacks up against Arsenal’s current trifecta. While Hartman’s numbers may be inflated somewhat because he is playing against lower-level opposition, there is still evidence that he would provide a better creative outlet than his prospective team-mates, and the only cause for concern defensively is a low tackle success rate. If he can improve his judgement on when to go for a challenge and when to hang back, he could easily become a first-rate all-round full-back.

He’s also likely the faster than the three players presently on the books, as well as being the youngest and therefore having plenty of room to improve and smooth off a few of the rougher edges. No fee has yet been mentioned for a possible future bid, but unless it is exorbitant then there is plenty of reason to believe that Hartman would represent a smart signing.

The players himself has already admitted that Chelsea were interested in signing him in January, and had a bid rejected with Feyenoord unwilling to part with him mid-season as they pushed for another Dutch title – in the end, they finished second but won the KNVB Cup in Arne Slot’s third and final campaign with the club. Hartman’s own season ended in March when he sustained the injury that still sidelines him now. He ended with seven assists in 37 appearances across all major domestic and continental competitions, although he failed to score.

Ultimately, Arsenal scouting Hartman may amount to little. This is not a move this is realistically going to happen before January, and anything could happen in the meantime. But it may well be a shrewd signing by Arsenal if they do go in that direction -and it would almost certainly signal a tactical shift towards a more balanced, attacking formation under Arteta.