Roberto De Zerbi is adamant Ethan Nwaneri will change into a ‘top player’ after the Arsenal loanee scored on his Marseille debut.
Nwaneri agreed to spent the remainder of the 2025-26 season on loan on the French club after struggling for minutes under Mikel Arteta.
The midfielder, who became the youngest player in Premier League history when he made his Arsenal debut in 2022, was an everyday for the Gunners last season but has not began a league game this term.
Nwaneri found the back of the online only a day after his move to Marseille as Roberto De Zerbi’s side beat Lens in Ligue 1.
The 18-year-old’s curled effort doubled Marseille’s lead at Stade Velodrome after Amine Gouiri broke the deadlock inside 4 minutes.
Gouri added Marseille’s third within the second half before previously top-placed Lens scored a consolation goal through Rayan Fofana.
The deserved victory sent Marseille to inside five points of second-placed Lens and 7 behind title favourites and Champions League holders PSG.
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‘We defended well and deserved to win,’ De Zerbi said after the victory. ‘I’d have liked to attain more but they’re a really strong team that deserves its place.
‘If we manage to breed this level consistently, we can be a solid team. Otherwise, we won’t go anywhere.’
On Arsenal academy graduate Nwaneri, De Zerbi added: ‘Ethan will change into a top player, I’m sure about that.
‘You may see the standard, the impact… he’s so good, same for [fellow January signing] Quinten Timber.’
Despite joining Marseille on loan, Nwaneri is seen as a future first-team regular by Arsenal, who handed him a brand new contract until 2030 in the summertime.
But his game-time dried up within the first-half of the season after Arsenal signed Noni Madueke from Chelsea and Eberechi Eze from Crystal Palace.
Explaining his decision to loan out Nwaneri, Gunners boss Arteta said: ‘I feel the talented young players that we’ve need minutes, and on this case, Ethan wasn’t having enough minutes, and the very last thing that we would like is to chop his development because he’s such a talent and someone who lives and breathes football; that’s his life.
‘After discussing it with him, his father, the agent, and the club, we decided the perfect thing to do was to depart and go on loan.
‘Then we’ve to choose the correct place, and having all the choices, understand the experience that we had in Marseille as well with [William Saliba].
‘The indisputable fact that Roberto [De Zerbi] is there and he’s an incredible developer of young talent and he’s a very courageous manager in the way in which he plays, the way in which he plays with young talent as well and he has a giant track record about that.
‘I feel it matches the way in which of playing for the qualities that we would like to see for Ethan. So it’s going to be an excellent experience for him.’
Nwaneri’s next task for Marseille can be a Champions League clash against Club Brugge on Wednesday night.
Marseille are currently nineteenth within the Champions League table with the top-eight advancing straight to the knockout stages and the subsequent 16 sides going right into a play-off.
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