Despite the ongoing protestations from Arsene Wenger, the Arsenal transfer rumours linking the club with Karim Benzema just will not go away and there is a strong feeling in the football media that our manager is not being entirely honest about his hopes of signing the France international star.
The Daily Mail, for instance, are reporting that the prof is set to make an offer for the 27-year old striker which, if accepted, would break the Arsenal transfer record that is currently the £42.5 million we paid the same club for Mesut Ozil a couple of years ago. The paper also claims that Benzema would become the club’s top earner on around £150,000 if the deal was done.
But is is perhaps telling that Arsenal are trying to use big money offers to grease the wheels of this transfer rather than Wenger’s talk of waiting and seeing what comes up. Hopefully that West Ham woe has convinced the boss that he needs to be more proactive in the remaining 22 days of the transfer window.
So maybe there is also some truth to the reports in Spain, reported by Metro, that we are reviving our transfer interest in Benzema’s former strike partner Gonzalo Higuain. The Argentina international is said to be keen to leave his current club Napoli and the Italian club, despite their ridiculous talk of a £60 million+ transfer fee, are concerned about having a player that does not want to be there. Apparently he has already rejected a new contract from the Serie A side.
So if Arsenal have a record transfer bid knocked back by Real Madrid, will we be moving on to Higuain instead?