Manchester United have reportedly won the competitive race to sign Arsenal’s highly rated academy player Ayden Heaven.

The 18-year-old defender joined Arsenal’s youth setup from West Ham United more than five years ago and was promoted to the Under-21 side after spending the summer as part of the first team’s pre-season squad. Heaven made his senior debut in the Carabao Cup earlier this season, but is yet to earn a single minute of Premier League football.

The boyhood Arsenal fan will be out of contract this summer and attracted interest from numerous clubs across the continent, including Spanish giants Barcelona. However, United are poised to snap up the teenage talent with an agreement set to be “formally sealed” according to Fabrizio Romano.

Arsenal supposedly offered Heaven a new deal and Bundesliga outfit Eintracht Frankfurt made multiple approaches which were all rebuffed. Heaven has had his medical at United booked and could be announced later this week.

As a versatile, left-footed defender, Heaven has been touted as a back-up for Lisandro Martinez in Ruben Amorim’s back-three system.

“I’ve always been quite tall so I had the benefit of using my physical attributes against the other players, who were usually much smaller than me,” the England under-19 international recalled in an interview with Arsenal’s official website. Standing at more than 6’2 (1.89m), Heaven still has a physical edge of most senior players – he is five inches taller than Martinez, for reference.

While he does have experience of playing as left-back in a flat four-man rearguard, it remains to be seen whether United will consider him as a wing-back option.

Amorim has identified the left-sided role in his favoured 3-4-3 shape as an era in desperate need of reinforcements. United have had multiple bids for Lecce’s Patrick Dorgu rebuffed this window and are also thought to have considered triggering the buy-back clause in Alvaro Carreras’ contract at Benfica.

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