Boss Mick McCarthy expects Arsenal’s interest in Tyrone Mings to motivate the left-back to play even better than he has up to now. Yesterday, Gunners boss Arsene Wenger confirmed that he was keeping tabs on the 21-year-old.

“I hope it affects him and he plays even better because he knows people are coming to watch him,” McCarthy said of Mings, who is contracted until June 2017.

“How about thinking it’s a really positive thing when you’ve got Arsenal and Arsene Wenger looking at you?

“If I’d got Arsene Wenger looking at me as a player and thinking I should play for him, I’d be thrilled. My chest would be pumped out, I’d be flying. They could send all the scouts they like down. I think Ty’s like that. I think it will have a positive effect on him.”

Was he annoyed about Wenger speaking publicly about his player? “That doesn’t bother me. He gets asked and I’m not a whinger, I don’t whinge about things like that.

“It’s part of the process, and [players] know scouts come down, so what’s the point of him telling lies anyway and saying ‘no’?

“I think it’s a real positive for us and for Ty, so I don’t think anything other than that he’s probably doing us a favour - he’s got a player motivated.

“Ty wants to get in the Premier League with us. But you know, at the end of the season if it doesn’t happen and Arsenal want to come and throw shed-loads of money at him, there’s not a lot we can do except negotiate and see what happens.

“We’ve seen already that Cressy went, we replaced him with a left-back, who Arsenal now apparently are looking at.

“Leicester wanted Didz and he didn’t go, so it’s just part of the gig, part of my job. It doesn’t worry me.”

He added: “I don’t anticipate losing anybody in January though. If we are in the mix, no one will be going anywhere as far as I am concerned.”

It’s been a remarkable rise for Mings, who joined the Blues two years ago this month from non-league Chippenham for just £10,000 - £5,000 when he moved, plus another £5,000 when he made his Town debut, as well as a pre-season friendly which was played at the start of 2013/14.

The Evo-Stik League Southern side don’t have a sell-on for the one-time Southampton trainee, who wasn’t even formally contracted to them when former Blues U18s coach and defender Russell Osman, whose son Toby was also at Chippenham, recommended him to McCarthy, who quickly signed him up after a trial.

The Town boss says no one anticipated quite such fast progress: “Nobody thought that, I didn’t think that. I knew we’d got potentially a good player, that’s why I was happy to let Cressy go and fulfil his ambitions. I knew we’d got a good left-back.”

Photo: Action Images

Suffolk_n_Good added 07:09 - Dec 6 (Clicks fingers) "a bottle of your finest Champagne for that nice Mr Osman please, if you can please kind Sir!!) ;)
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Paulblue62 added 07:14 - Dec 6 Mick is so cool. Nothing seems to fluster him. I think I might be falling in love with him. If only he was better looking. ;-)
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bluebrit added 07:18 - Dec 6 Mings improvement has been phenomenal; he is such an exciting player to watch. No doubt there will be a few people at Southampton wondering how they let him slip through the net. Still, their loss is our gain.
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rfretwell added 09:06 - Dec 6 A brilliant spot by Russell Osman who was a fine centre half with Butch for us - such great days those for Town fans. Better looking than Mick too - he did some male modelling!
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Len_Brennan added 09:23 - Dec 6 I feel a bit sorry for Chippenham. It's great that we get a player so cheaply that has been turned into £10m potential Premiership & England defender, but for them to only get £10k, when we took a team of kids down there to fulfil the fixture part of the deal did strike me as a bit taking the p*ss.I know how we would feel if Real Madrid (or Lazio) agreed a game with us, only to show up without Ronaldo, James, Bale, Isco, Benzeme, Ramos etc. A few quid can make clubs like that, but I guess business is business & you do the best deal you can & get away with fulfilling contracts to the minimal level necessary.

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DurhamTownFan added 09:39 - Dec 6 Would it be totally mad to suggest that we'd give some potential profit to Chippenham? I'm not talking 1m, but surely at least a good will gesture of say 100,000 could make a big statement about us to other non league clubs who we might want to do business with on future. Maybe that's a bit rose tinted, but I'd do it
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spanishblue added 10:10 - Dec 6 What a nice thought Durham blue I think a pre-season friendly for our return to p/league next year with a full squad will do nicely
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oldelsworthyfan added 11:32 - Dec 6 Mings is just the kind player we simply have to keep if we're going to make it in the Premiership. Dream on Wenger!
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dirtydingusmagee added 10:59 - Dec 8 we have potentially the best squad of players for a long time now.The last thing we want now is to lose anyone.They are playing as a team and they are ALL key players.Hopefully nothing will disrupt the momentum and spirit that is building . Got a really good feeling that ITFC are on brink of another golden era .COYB
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