Mikel Arteta confirmed this week that he is closely monitoring the progress of William Saliba.
The 19-year-old is spending the second half of the season with the Ligue 1 outfit after being limited to U23 appearances with Arsenal following his return from a loan spell at former club Saint-Etienne last summer.
In a deal designed to get the centre-back playing regularly, that is exactly what is happening as Saliba has already made 12 appearances across all competitions and has received widespread praise for his performances.
But will the Frenchman be a part of Arteta's plans for next season?
Well, the Arsenal boss has admitted that he monitoring how the teenager has been faring in France ahead of the summer transfer window.
"We are having meetings very often to assess what they are doing," said Arteta when asked if he's keeping tabs on the progress of Saliba as well as fellow loanee Dinos Mavropanos. "Obviously we are getting all the information and watching their games because I want to keep a very close eye on what they are doing.
"We were talking yesterday with our loan's manager Ben Knapper who is in charge of monitoring everything that we are doing.
"We are in contact with the players and let's see.
"It's good news that they're playing and good news that they have the possibility to have a lot of minutes, because that's going to give us a much better perception of where they are and how we can use them."
Did Arteta's admission spur Saliba on during his latest Nice appearance?
That would appear to be the case as details of his performance in the 2-1 win over Nimes on Wednesday evening has been revealed by @SalibaXtra_on Twitter and it makes for good reading.
As expected, Saliba's performance garnered some chatter from other the
@Arsenal44464683 said: "Our future cb with Gabriel."
@anasz149 said: "He will be back next season hopefully."
@afcturn said: "Decent half from Saliba. Liked what I saw but Nimes aren't testing enough. Really love his pace of pass on the floor. Sets it up on stride for his players very well. His long ball switch play is great too."
