Illan Meslier has already made a debut at Arsenal.In January 2020, aged 19, he made his first senior appearance for Leeds United in the Emirates Stadium.While the hosts would eventually make their Premier League advantage pay with a 1-0 home win against then Championship opposition, that FA Cup third-round tie is best remembered as the first time Marcelo Bielsa’s Leeds side went toe-to-toe with a top-flight outfit. Meslier, Leeds’s second-choice goalkeeper at the time and only on loan from French club Lorient, was a virtually unknown quantity. His performance in north London was a pleasant surprise to the travelling supporters.The teenager stroked the ball around with confidence. He clipped passes from his area to the sidelines with accuracy and never looked overawed by the occasion or the 58,000-plus crowd, despite it being his first game at senior level in English football.Two hundred and fourteen matches later, Meslier is on his way back to Arsenal, but not in the role anyone would have expected if you had asked them at his Leeds peak in 2021. Back then, tying him down to a five-year contract at Elland Road was seen as a major coup.Only four goalkeepers had more Premier League clean sheets in that 2020-21 season than Meslier’s 11. He was 21 then, considered one of Europe’s best young goalkeepers and a future France No 1.Why Arsenal still need to sign a left-wingerJon MackenzieIt was so rare to have someone with so much experience at such a young age. He was confident, played out from the back with his feet, took risks and, crucially, pulled off immense stops.It felt like Leeds had resolved their goalkeeping future, nailing down someone who would fetch a transfer fee in the tens of millions if it ever came to selling him. And yet, here we are, at the end of that five-year contract, with him released from last season’s role as the club’s third-choice ’keeper.Meslier was one of the many victims caught in the wreckage of Leeds’ 2021-22 and 2022-23 seasons.