Arsenal U21

Arsenal's Under-21s go into the season under a new head coach, David Horseman, who took over in August 2026 after Max Porter's year in charge ended and he moved on; Porter himself had stepped up only twelve months earlier when Mehmet Ali left for Brentford's first-team staff.

The side traces back to 1887, a reserve team set up a year after the first eleven took shape in Plumstead as Royal Arsenal. It has carried several names since — reserves, then a Premier Reserve League side from 1999, then, from 2012, the Under-21s — but the job has stayed the same: get players ready for the first team.

That job is best measured by who has come through it. Bukayo Saka is the current name attached to Hale End, the academy shorthand that has stuck to Arsenal's youth setup; Cesc Fàbregas and Jack Wilshere came the same way in earlier years, and Harry Kane spent time there as a boy before Tottenham took him on — a detail that sharpens the rivalry across north London rather than softens it.

The FA Youth Cup is where the U21s have actually won things, seven times in all. The Premier League 2 title and the Premier League Cup have both gone unwon.

Matches are played at Meadow Park in Borehamwood, a ground the U21s share with Arsenal Women and which Boreham Wood FC own outright. With a fresh coach in place, the near-term task is straightforward.