**Arsenal**are on the lookout for players to make the difference in the final third and fire them towards trophies in the 2025/26 season. Outgoings will help make more money to contribute to the budget and one of the most marginal figures in the squad seems to be on his way out of the first-team squad.
Marquinhos has hardly been a part of the first team plans at the club. Still only 22 years old, he has time to make the most of the talent that attracted **Arsenal**to his signature in the first place. To do that, he is closing a chapter that only briefly burst into life and plans to go back to where his journey began.
For the first five years of his time at the club, Mikel Arteta would look to technical turned sporting director Edu Gaspar as his right-hand man to assist him in the rebuild of the squad. In summer 2022, the Brazilian brought in a compatriot, a then 19-year-old Marquinhos, to add to the squad’s strength.
Edu said, “At 19, he is still very young, so he is a player for the future. We look forward to him now joining us for pre-season, making his new home, and continuing to grow and develop with us.”
The winger was still in the nascent stage of his senior career with less than 50 appearances to his name for Sao Paulo. But he was one of the 40 names on the shortlist for the Golden Boy Award that year and a player who also courted the interest of Wolves. There was hope that the club had acquired another gem from the 'Samba Nation' to follow in the footsteps of fellow forward Gabriel Martinelli.
The teenager was not the only Brazilian addition that summer. Gabriel Jesus joined the Gunners in July to replace Alexandre Lacazette as the first-choice central forward in the squad. With a clique of key players forming from the same nation, the club hoped to take Marquinhos under their wing.
**Marquinhos**made his debut for the Gunners against **Zurich**in the Europa League at the start of September. It would be a display to remember. He swept an Eddie Nketiah delivery into the back of the net to put the team a goal to the good before returning the favour for the striker in a 2-1 win.
“He’s very popular, with no English, just with his smile and attitude. He has earned the respect and admiration from everybody here” were the words of Arteta after he had that immediate impact.
But as **Arsenal**were riding the crest of the wave in their first serious title charge under Arteta, the Spaniard seemed to focus on a smaller group of players in the league that did not include him.
He would partake in his first Premier League game as a replacement for Bukayo Saka in a 3-0 victory over Brentford. Over the next three months, more minutes only came his way in the cups.
He featured in two triumphs over Bodø/Glimt in the **Europa League**before playing as a right winger in a 3-1 Carabao Cup loss to **Brighton**and as a substitute in a 3-0 **FA Cup**win over Oxford United.
Arteta also allowed the winger to try and get to grips with the Under-21 team, but he had seen enough of the player after a six-month stint. The start of 2023 began an odyssey of loans for Marquinhos.
The journey towards the exit door
The destination for the Brazilian in the winter window would be another English club as he moved to the east coast to team up with Norwich City. There, he would repeat the feat from his debut for the Gunners with a goal and an assist in the first half of a 2-0 **Championship**victory over Cardiff City.
But again, the stint would peter out as soon as it set alight. The most outstanding incident in his loan after that debut was a rescinded red card in a 1-1 stalemate against Huddersfield Town. He did not register another goal in his next ten appearances for the Canaries and came back to the capital city.
At the start of the 2023/24 season, he switched allegiances with a loan to **Ligue 1**club Nantes. His time in France involved another brief six-month spell in which he earned less than 150 minutes from seven outings, of which six were as a substitute, in the league without a goal or an assist to his name.
By the beginning of 2024, his attention was on the Brazil Under-23 team as he eyed up a place in their squad for a pre-Olympic tournament with a view to the summer. That focus fuelled more tension between him and **Nantes,**and the disgruntled player packed his bags to head off to his home nation.
At a crossroads in his career, the winger was back in the Brazilian leagues as he joined **Fluminense**for a loan spell that lasted until the start of this year. He scored a couple of goals for the club in the Copa Libertadores before leaving to become part of the squad for Cruzeiro in yet another loan.
It looks like this is where his future will lie. The new manager, Leonardo Jardim, has taken a liking to Marquinhos, who has been absent from their last three matchday squads, but the club had to refrain from giving him too many games before they were sure that there was a way of signing him for good.
Jardim said, “The club and I asked Arsenal to get him to play a few more games so we can assess his quality. He has quality, but we are waiting for Arsenal to open the door for him to play more games.”
Now Fabrizio Romano has reported that the deal is all but done between the two clubs. Marquinhos had moved to north London with a contract that continued until 2027, but it is clear that his time with the team is up. At last, he seems to have some clarity about a way forward for his future in the game.