The Gunners have joined a number of Europe’s elites in the race for versatile Monaco forward Maghnes Akliouche. The club have begun intensifying their pursuit of forward additions ahead of pre-season. A versatile forward or attacking midfielder is reportedly high on the list, separate from the pursuit of a left winger and striker.
Links have emerged to the likes of Eberechi Eze, but the search for a player of that profile has now taken them to France.
According to L’Équipe, the Gunners are expressing interest in Akliouche ahead of a potential summer move. After an impressive campaign with Monaco, the French side have reportedly conceded in their attempts to keep hold of him and have now acknowledged that he will be on the move this window. This has attracted a lot of interest which now includes the Gunners as they seek to bolster their frontline.
Premier League rivals pose stiff competition
Arsenal will have to fight off interest from a Premier League quartet if they want to win his signature. Manchester City, Manchester United, Tottenham Hotspur and Nottingham Forest have all made their interests known and will pose a significant threat to Arsenal’s attempts. Furthermore, the 23-year-old will command a fee close to €70 million.
Technical ability and versatility appeal to Arteta
Known for his versatility and technical ability, Akliouche is one of the best young talents in France. He made his first team debut in the 2021/22 season but has truly come into the limelight over the last two campaigns.
He contributed an impressive tally of seven goals and 12 assists last term, establishing himself as one of the first names on the Monaco team sheet. His most notable goal contribution came in a Champions League league phase game against Barcelona in September. He opened the scoring via an emphatic finish after dribbling his way from outside the penalty area.
Capable of operating in midfield and on the right wing, Arsenal could profit from a player of his profile in the squad. His price is an obvious sticking point, but we will have to wait and see.
Just Arsenal will keep you updated as more develops.
Thoughts, Gooners?
Author: Benjamin Kenneth
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Surely this has to be a smoke screen, too many race to keep track
Never heard of him, but I’m sure he’s welcome to join the army of players about to sign for Arsenal.
Meanwhile, Biereth is over at Monaco killing it. How much did we let him go for?🤔
Prepare yourself … £4m apparently.
@Bertie
Unbelievable…🤨
That was all he was worth while playing in England at the time.
It’s so easy in retrospect, with Kane and Declan Rice as perfect examples.
Who honestly thought that Biereth was good enough to lead our attack in the PL?
Ken, it’s much like the Balogun lad that we sold to Monaco. He lit up the French league when we loaned him to Reims, but hasn’t done a lot in his 2 seasons at Monaco.
Exactly HD.
I don’t understand fans who want to find fault at every opportunity.
The retrospective knowledge they have is unbelievable!!
@Herr Drier
While Biereth showed promise at every team he was loaned out to. But hey why not just throw £70 mil at a player from a so called weaker league instead of nurturing academy prospects . 🤔
We got 40m euros for balogun, but only £4m for biereth – we clearly didn’t know how good biereth was, and that’s on us (arsenal). Even if he wasn’t good enough for our first team (which isn’t clear at all – it probably would have been smart to give him a few chances before selling), he was let go for far far less than his value.
@ken1945
We might have known what he was capable of, had we at least given him a chance. But hey, many articles on here attesting to Arteta prowess with nurturing young talent can’t be wrong…
He was loaned out to three clubs
IKC Waalwijk(?)
Pld 13 – 2 goals – 0 assists
Motherwell
Pld 15 – 6 goals – 5 assists
Sturm Graz
Pld 16 – 11 goals – 1 assist
All three clubs play in a much inferior league.
If you this is the kind of player you think would have made the grade at The Arsenal, then we have no need to buy a striker, as the stats of Havertz, Jesus and every one of our forward players are better than that I do believe.
He is currently valued at around 30 million euros due to his current form in France, so we can see progress is being made, but, if MA had stuck with him as our striker, so you think the fans would have been patient with those stats above?
I somehow doubt that and the fact that the first two clubs he was loaned out to, showed no interest in pursuing him further.
Perhaps they saw something that The Arsenal also identified at that stage of his career that didn’t convince them of his long term viability?
Could he have led us to the PL title? Did MA make a mistake?
A matter of opinion I guess, but in hindsight, I don’t think so, but respect your opinion that he might have done NY_Gunner.
1. Loans very often don’t tell the full story – many players have had mediocre loan moves when younger, but later went on to have top careers – just look at harry kane’s loan stats!
2. He’s not good enough to win us the title now, so we made no mistake letting him go for peanuts? This is making excuses for the club – at best, we grossly underestimated his value. We sold balogun for around 10x more money, and he’s not worth 10x more.
We got it wrong – the only question is how badly did we get it wrong. Did we let go of a player who could have been a major contributor here, a squad player or just someone we could have sold for far more money?
@ken1945
My point being, what’s the use of having an academy and not bringing up those players through the ranks, while burying and utilising their talents before looking elsewhere. I do doubt he would have been expected to “lead us to the title”, just as the other two players you mentioned didn’t either. But since Arteta is touted as being one who develops young talent, I’m sure he could have developed Biereth and adapted him to our style of play. Had he given him a chance or been really paying attention. Just saying…
* Nurturing, not burying their talents.
Brah, 70 million euros? Seriously?
At this point I’m convinced Just Arsenal writers are using some crappy AI to write their articles without fact checking anything.
One quick Google and you’ll see it’s actually 40 million…
But yeah let’s just pretend Transfermatkt doesn’t exist and we’re all just idiots
Shades of Vieira from what i have seen of him.Technically gifted but i cannot imagine he would move to Arsenal as a back up for Saka.With Nwaneri and the very talented Dowman in the wings we really do not need yet another left footed ball player.