As the Arsenal squad shook off the jet lag and made their way down the grassy embankment to training on Monday in Washington DC, they arrived to four rows of pristinely presented yoga mats.
Kai Havertz plonked himself next to former Chelsea team-mate Jorginho, while fellow new boy Jurrien Timber performed his stretches beside Bukayo Saka, but there was only ever one spot that Declan Rice was going to occupy at George Mason University Field House — and that was next to Eddie Nketiah.
It is a reunion that has been a decade in the making.
Both are 24, with Nketiah having 131 appearances and 32 goals for Arsenal and Rice now known as the £105 million man, the most expensive British signing made by a Premier League club.
Ten years ago, however, they were west London boys rather than north London footballers, young dreamers whose worlds were shaken by rejection as opposed to the confident and assured personalities they project nowadays.
Day ✌️
???? Washington D.C. pic.twitter.com/ye3VEJNKOI
— Arsenal (@Arsenal) July 18, 2023
While at Chelsea’s academy, Nketiah would bring bowls of jollof rice on the team bus for Rice and his Chelsea team-mates to share but that came to an abrupt halt when they both suffered the jarring setback of being released as 14-year-olds.
It is that adversity and resilience which allows Nketiah to fully appreciate how their careers have realigned here in the United States as part of a squad gunning for the Premier League title.
“We got released on the same day at under-14,” Nketiah tells The Athletic.
“It was very tough to take but it shows the character we both have to come back. It’s funny how life works that we’re both now playing at Arsenal.
“I’ve got a good relationship with Dec. We first played together at under-nines and were together until under-14s at Chelsea, so you can imagine as kids we’ve played a lot of games and travelled together.
“My dad and his dad were very supportive. They were at every game and we started to build a relationship, travelling on tours together.
“I’m really proud of the progress he has made, seeing him as a kid and the man he has grown into now. I’m really happy to have him here and I’m sure he’s going to help us a lot. We all want to win together so hopefully he can be another piece of the puzzle to bring us closer to where we want to be.”
Rice has achieved enough to have closure on that chapter of his career but to this day he still doesn’t know the exact reasons why he was released. He presumes it was because he was going through a growth spurt and his body’s co-ordination was impacted and Nketiah’s slight frame didn’t help his case when he was up against fellow strikers Dominic Solanke and Tammy Abraham.
Nketiah says his Chelsea years, particularly at that age, were a huge part of his life.
“You go to Chelsea every other day, you’re known as the boy who plays for Chelsea,” he says. “It’s part of your identity kind of thing. Accepting that being gone is hard to take. Luckily for me, I have a great family around me who have always supported me, and I think what was really good for me was that the gap was not too long between being released and having an opportunity to go to Arsenal.
Declan Rice doing some light work on the bike today. He’s one of several players who aren’t doing work on the grass today, as planned. They’re building his fitness up after joining later. pic.twitter.com/BezE8Rip8W
— Jordan Campbell (@JordanC1107) July 17, 2023
“It was probably four or five days, so it allowed me not to stay too down for too long and be able to refocus and know there’s another challenge which can be even more beautiful. That’s the way I looked at it. I had to have a lot of maturity because I did have my down days.
“That’s your dream, to get scouted, you get accepted, grow part of that academy, you want to go all the way. But sometimes this is life. I am a very religious person, I believe in God. I know everything happens for a reason.”
“It’s just about knowing this is the path that was chosen for you and unfortunately it wasn’t down this path, but there’s also other routes to the top. There’s players that stayed there (Chelsea) and didn’t reach the levels that myself or Declan have now. This is just life, it isn’t always going to go your way. Having that experience really shaped me as a person and how I am able to deal with disappointments and prove again and again. It’s the mentality I have, it’s how to try to look at life.”
If his faith helped him rebound quickly, both their journeys were still riddled with doubt even as they turned professional. When Rice was turning 16, making him eligible to sign his scholarship forms, his future caused a 50-50 split among coaches at West Ham.
There were similar doubts about Nketiah as he approached the end of his scholarship deal at Arsenal and the cliff-edge of professionalism or release approached.
Despite Nketiah being the top scorer for the under-18s with 24 goals in 28 appearances, Dutch academy manager Andries Jonker took some convincing by other coaches to be sure that the 17-year-old striker was a rounded enough player for Arsenal.
He was viewed as an instinctive, clinical striker but whether he had the other tools to fit into Arsenal’s style was up for debate.
What Rice and Nketiah’s journeys show is that there is no perfect formula for reaching the top. Players develop at different times and opportunities arise at different moments.
Arsenal have Nketiah, Folarin Balogun, Bukayo Saka, Reiss Nelson and Emile Smith Rowe as established faces in the senior squad.
All were born between 1999 and 2001, Arsenal were able to bring through the raft of talent by taking a more concentrated approach to recruitment. They did not want to stockpile talent in the way they believed Chelsea and Manchester City were doing because they believed it blocked the pathway for players.
Balogun is hoping to get more game time at Arsenal (Photo: Tim Nwachukwu/Getty Images)
They chose to steer clear of signings for positions in which they had identified a top talent coming through at surrounding age groups.
After the age of 14, players would start to be identified as being exceptional talents and would be moved up age groups in keeping with Arsene Wenger’s motto that if the environment becomes too comfortable then they had to change it. That was their way of ensuring a best-vs-best culture so these senior players were used to being challenged against each other despite being in different age groups.
Another player at the end of the path to the first team, who was on the other side of Rice in Monday’s warm-up, is Balogun. He will be contemplating those same big-picture questions.
He is at a crossroads after returning from an excellent loan spell in Ligue 1 with Reims. Only three players, including Alexandre Lacazette and Kylian Mbappe, scored more than his 21 goals in Ligue 1 last season. He has stated he does not want another loan and believes he needs to be a regular starter again in the coming campaign.
Balogun has spoken with clarity and this week said he is “cool” with whatever happens. His former under-23 coach Kevin Betsy would say it is in keeping with how he takes control of his own destiny.
“Two seasons ago he was already part of the make-up of the first team squad, so he wasn’t someone we were planning on having at under-23 level as we thought he was waiting on his big chance,” Betsy tells The Athletic.
“But he wanted to continue playing and scoring goals so much that he requested he come back and play. That was his desire to learn.
“So many players don’t want to play under-23s because they think they’re ahead of that. We could play Leeds away in front of 12,000 or Blackburn in front of 100. It didn’t matter to him, he was there to play.
“Flo is extremely humble. You don’t drop back down if you don’t have humility.”
Nketiah and Balogun never played together often given the former was a more settled part of Arteta’s squad because of his age. But the first-team coaching staff made sure that Balogun was dropping down with a plan to come back into the fold.
“Albert (Stuivenberg) and Mikel would do a lot of his game reviews,” says Betsy.
“They were very clear in terms of what his development plan was. Flo needed to improve his hold-up and link-up because he was very good at running into space and finishing. The other thing they wanted to improve was his reactions to start pressing.
“We played him as a central striker but we had another striker in Mika Biereth so, instead of moving one to the wing and interrupting their learning, we played with two strikers.
“I found him to be like a sponge and a fantastic person to work with. Sometimes you had to drag him off the pitch because he was wanting to work on his finishing all the time, but the loading on his legs would be too much.”
Rice and Nketiah train together in Washington (Photo: Stuart MacFarlane/Getty Images)
There are strong parallels with Nketiah and Balogun. They set record-breaking goal tallies in the academy, and Balogun is now discovering the same tension Nketiah faced when transitioning into a top-level squad.
After a disappointing loan spell at Leeds in 2019-20, Nketiah had to choose whether to stay at Arsenal or pursue a starting spot elsewhere. He backed himself and carved out a role last season, starting nine league games in a row in the absence of Gabriel Jesus.
While the US striker has said he doesn’t feel any need to prove himself as a first-team player this pre-season, he has Jesus, Nketiah, Leandro Trossard and Kai Havertz for competition.
Nketiah refuses to see himself as a back-up option and that is a mentality shared by Balogun, but is there a lesson the younger man can learn from his team-mate’s patience?
“Every player has different pathways. Eddie had always been a phenomenal centre-forward and learned a lot even though he didn’t play as much,” Betsy says.
“He waited patiently and took his chance. It’s testament to him and what he’s been able to put his mind through. It’s not easy when you’re not playing when you feel you’re ready. That takes a lot of mental strength, because when the chance comes you only get one. He’s had all that waiting and he did it in the cup games.
“Eddie’s physical frame is quite slight. But he is extremely strong in his core, so when you see him in 1v1 duels he rarely gets pushed off. He’s got really good ball manipulation too but he’s clearly worked on his movement to create space for himself.
“It’s a beautiful thing when young players fulfil their potential.”
Inter Milan are interested in Balogun’s signature and Arsenal are looking for around £50million if they are to sell. If circumstances dictate he has to move on to take charge of his club career then Betsy is backing him to thrive.
“Flo could play for any Premier League team and the evidence is there,” he says. “He will get to the top. Whatever level you put Flo at, he will rise there eventually.”
(Lead picture: Simon Peach/PA/GettyImages)
