Max Dowman leads charge for ever younger stars at Arsenal and beyond

If Mikel Arteta had any doubts that Max Dowman is equipped for the big stage they will have been dispelled in a few seconds on Tuesday night. Dowman, having just become the first 15-year-old to play in the Champions League when he replaced Leandro Trossard in the 72nd minute against Slavia Prague, received the ball on the right flank from Declan Rice and immediately drew a foul from his marker, David Zima. A few minutes later he repeated the trick after effortlessly controlling a long diagonal pass, expertly dragging the ball along the touchline despite the attention of another defender.

“That’s personality, that’s courage and you cannot teach that,” Arteta said. “You have it or you don’t. It doesn’t matter what his passport says. You throw him in this context and he’s able to adapt and have a good performance. I’m really happy with that.”

With Arsenal strolling to a 10th straight victory thanks to a penalty from Bukayo Saka and two goals from the makeshift striker Mikel Merino, Arteta felt the moment had arrived for Dowman to break Youssoufa Moukoko’s record as the youngest player in Champions League history.

Dowman, who joined Arsenal almost a decade ago from his local side Billericay Town, had been tipped to achieve the feat sooner rather than later, having been on the bench against Athletic Bilbao and Olympiakos. But an injury crisis among Arsenal’s attackers that has left Arteta without seven players meant there was no room for sentimentality and this was all about necessity in a week when the Premier League leaders face three away trips, culminating with Saturday’s meeting with Sunderland.

The same applied with the 17-year-old striker Andre Harriman-Annous, who came on in the 81st minute on Tuesday and was the main striker in last week’s Carabao Cup win against Brighton, when Dowman became the youngest player to start for the club. With Viktor Gyökeres and Gabriel Martinelli not back until after the international break, the teenage pair are likely to be involved at the Stadium of Light. Arsenal named two goalkeepers on their bench at Slavia owing to a lack of bodies.

A shy Dowman at first seemed reluctant when David Raya pushed him and Harriman-Annous forward to take the applause of Arsenal’s travelling supporters at the final whistle in Prague. Dowman, who has thick braces on his teeth and a mop of curly hair that is longer at the front in a style widely favoured by today’s teenage boys, has plenty of growing to do, but already seems capable of handling the physical demands of men’s football.

Teenage breakthrough stars are a growing trend across Europe, with four of the top 10 youngest players in Champions League history having set their mark in the past five years, after the former Chelsea defender Celestine Babayaro held the record for more than 25. Moukoko struggled to replicate his early promise at Borussia Dortmund and moved to FC Copenhagen for a cut-price fee in the summer, but the presence in that top 10 of Barcelona’s Lamine Yamal, Paris Saint-Germain’s Warren Zaïre-Emery and Milan’s Francesco Camarda indicates outstanding young players are being given their chance much earlier. “The difference is in how the players are coached,” said Zima when asked about Dowman. “Of course, there are many more footballers in England, it’s a bigger country and every now and then a miracle player is born.”

It is no secret that Arsenal earmarked Dowman as a player with immense potential several years ago, although even some members of their coaching staff are said to have been surprised at how quickly he adapted to training with the senior squad after turning 14 at the end of 2023. According to Adam Birchall, the Arsenal Under-18s head coach, who worked with Dowman at several youth levels, it has been part of a gradual change in approach that tries to ensure ultra-talented players are fast-tracked through the age groups if they are good enough.

“There’s been a shift in English coaching,” he told the Guardian last year. “They are starting younger. In my day, you didn’t really start playing until you were nine and 10, on a massive 11 v 11 pitch. And now you’re looking at lads starting at five years of age, which I think is quite logical. It will have a knock-on effect if you do your job in development. The thing that doesn’t change is the person … are they ready? I think Arsène [Wenger] used to speak about it a lot, but the last bit is: can the person deal with what it takes to be a top player?”

The challenge for Dowman, who is due to sit his GCSEs next summer, is keeping his feet on the ground as the spotlight continues to intensify.

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