Arsenal wonderkid Max Dowman offered crucial advice by only player to beat his record

The youngest-ever scorer in England’s top division admitted that he thought Max Dowman would be the one to break his record.

The Arsenal starlet made Premier League history on Saturday when he scored the second goal in the Gunners’ 2-0 win over Everton.

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The England U19 international slotted into an empty net after a superb solo run late on to seal victory for Mikel Arteta’s side.

Dowman broke James Vaughan’s 2005 feat for the youngest scorer in Premier League history, aged just 16 years and 73 days old.

However, the English top-flight record still belongs to Jason Dozzell, who was 16 days younger than Dowman when he opened his account for Ipswich against Coventry City on 4 February 1984.

Eight years later, the First Division rebranded as the Premier League, but the 58-year-old’s place in the history books remains intact.

Dozzell joined talkSPORT Breakfast on Wednesday, where he admitted he thought Dowman would be the one to break his record.

“Oh my god, when I first saw him, Alan [Brazil], in September, he had till March to get it. I thought, ‘My record has gone’,” he said.

“He’s that good, you know, but having been so young, he’s gonna have to be dipped in and out, and obviously got an injury just after Christmas, I think.

“So he’s out for a while, and just missed a record by a couple of weeks. So yeah, what a player he is.

“But as I said, I know everything he’s going through right now. All the noise, going back to school.

“Yeah, it’s quite surreal, but yeah, what a player.”

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Dowman, once described by Declan Rice as ‘the best 15-year-old in the country’, only made his senior debut in pre-season last summer.

talkSPORT’s Simon Jordan predicted the teenager was en route to becoming a world-beater in football like Lamine Yamal.

Dowman’s heroics eight months later have seen John Terry and Henry Winter already compare him to Lionel Messi and Kaka.

Dozzell is no stranger to dealing with similar hype, having also been catapulted into national fame after scoring his debut goal.

On his advice for Dowman, he added to talkSPORT: “People around you, keep your circle pretty small.

“As far as the pressure on the player, you’re so young, everything’s just going on over your head.

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“So, you’re not really thinking about that. You’re just riding this wave, and you just have to go with it.

“But, like I said, he’s got good people around him. He seems quite balanced in his life.

“And, just a fantastic player who’s going to go on to so many good things.

“Mikel Arteta’s got a big role to play. So do senior players because they’ve got a duty of care to look after him!”