Per Mertesacker insists it is not a cause for concern to see top young talent departing Arsenal and that instead he welcomes seeing youth products prove their quality away from the Emirates Stadium.
The Gunners lost two highly-rated prospects this summer in Xavier Amaechi and Krystian Bielik after both players indicated they would not sign new contracts in north London whilst Alex Iwobi, an academy product who went on to make 149 first-team appearances for Arsenal, was sold to Everton in a deal that could eventually be worth £40million.
Arsenal supporters will fear that Amaechi, who was also targeted by Barcelona, Inter Milan and Bayern Munich, might enjoy a similar rise to prominence as that of Serge Gnabry, who left the Gunners following the 2016 Olympics and is now a key player for Bayern and the German national team.
However Mertesacker says he welcomes the sight of academy products going elsewhere and that he considers it a sign of success when players from Hale End end up making the grade elswhere.
"We have, even from our side, academy players going to other countries, other clubs, inside out. So players who have not been playing with the first team but going somewhere else.
"And we take value… So for us this summer was really positive – you had Alex Iwobi going to Everton. That's one example. A player that established himself in the first-team.
"Then we have Xavier Amaechi who's gone to Hamburg and we get a fee and we get add-ons. And we get Krystian Bielik who goes to Derby in the Championship, he has been a part of our academy, so you get different pathways now for players.
"Jeff Reine-Adelaide [who joined Lyon from Angers this summer for a reported £20m] goes to France because we knew he wasn't getting the pathway in the first-team. But he creates value with that move, we have a clause that we get some percentage back so we want to create a lot of pathways."
Seeing Gnabry fulfill his rich potential first at Werder Bremen and Bayern Munich proved to be a fork in the road for Arsenal, who had significantly erred by sending the young winger on loan to Tony Pulis' West Bromwich Albion side as he recovered from a serious knee injury.
Pulis would hand Gnabry only one Premier League appearance and expressed doubt over whether the winger could feature in the top flight. The 24-year-old is now a regular for club and country, a player who Germany boss Joachim Low says "will always play under me".
Though Gnabry would surely play a major role in Arsenal's current plans were he to return now Mertesacker believes Arsenal were right to let the winger leave.
"He needed to learn a lot but at that time we had Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Theo Walcott in front of him, so he wouldn't have played, so he needs to go somewhere else," he said. "But, for us, it's then how can we create value out of these players who are part of our academy because, as I said, only a small percentage end up in the first-team at Arsenal.
"How can we then value these kids and make sure we get benefit? They are good, we have good players, possibly in England, we're now in a better position than ever because five years ago the German system would have been stronger probably, so we utilise it now that the system of the Premier League youth has excelled the German Bundesliga right now.
"That's why the German teams are looking everywhere so I think it was a really positive summer for us as a club in terms of how we could utilise academy players to the Premier League, Championship, League One, League Two with loans, who will stay with us or go to Germany 2. Bundesliga and get value back and invest in the academy again."
Per Mertesacker’s autobiography, Big Friendly German, is available in all good bookshops and signed copies available at www.decoubertin.co.uk/BFG. RRP £20.
