Jonker named head coach at Wolfsburg

We would like to wish our academy manager Andries Jonker every success following his appointment as head coach at Bundesliga side VFL Wolfsburg.

Andries has helped to guide the transformation of our academy over the past three seasons. Significant progress has been made in developing our infrastructure and our Hale End academy has undergone a complete rebuild, creating a modern facility designed to give our young players the best possible place to develop.

Andries joined us in July 2014 after serving as assistant manager at Wolfsburg. He previously spent seven years developing and implementing youth coaching reforms for the KNVB (Dutch FA) and worked as assistant coach to Louis van Gaal at Barcelona and Bayern Munich, where he later had a spell as interim head coach.

Our chief executive Ivan Gazidis said: "This is a great opportunity for Andries and we wish him every future success. Under Andries' guidance, we have made huge progress in our academy operations.

“Arsenal is known around the world for its development of young players and we are confident we will find the right person to continue to lead our progress."

Commenting on his move, Andries said: "I have had a wonderful three years at Arsenal. We have made significant progress and it has been great to be part of a club which puts such an emphasis on developing young players through its academy.

“I leave a great team of people who will continue to do a terrific job and I would like to thank everyone, including the board, chief executive Ivan Gazidis and Arsène Wenger for all the support.

“There are some top young players in the Arsenal academy. I look forward to seeing them progress their careers."