If this news is true, then it could be a blow to the hopes of Arsenal fans in having a successful and encouraging summer of spending in the transfer market, as well as being a blow to the plans of Arsene Wenger, unless the Frenchman does agree to up the offer for the Monaco and France international star Geoffrey Kondogbia.
The latest Arsenal transfer rumours reported by Metro claim that the Gunners have already lodged a bid of around £18 million for the dynamic central midfielder who did such damage to our Champions League dreams at the Emirates stadium, including scoring the opening goal in that 3-1 defeat.
But his French club have apparently laughed off the bid and told Wenger that he needs to pay nearly £25 million to get Kondogbia. With Serie A strugglers AC Milan also said to be interested in the 22-year old, maybe Monaco are trying to get an auction going, but after reports last week that Wenger had gone cold on the Morgan Schneiderlin after Southampton demanded around £25 million, how likely is the Arsenal boss to want to pay the same money for his second choice?
Is this more evidence that the prof is out of touch or is it the other clubs trying to fleece us?
Vidal, Krychowiak, Marchisio, Schneiderlin, Kondogbia. (in my personal order of preference)
No shortage of rumours!! I’m just crossing my fingers one of the above rumoured targets has some truth to it…
I will take Kondogbai as hes a pure DM…..the rest are mainly B2B CM…
unsure about Krychie
Not really… Kondogbia played a more advanced role the majority of games this season. This ‘pure DM’ is nonsense. Just check his Fifa rating Hafiz, that seems to be your main evaluation tool
If u want a pure dm u want one that sits in front of the back 4 breaks down play, intercepts and then has a great pass ratio. The best player in Europe for that last season was Francis coquelin. If we need another like that, then I would go for Victor wanyama or SVEN bender who are more defensive minded than the likes of kondogbia, schneirderlin etc.
I know this isn’t what people want to hear, But the rumours I am hearing from arsenal is that wenger is looking to keep arteta flamini diaby rosicky zelalem.bielik and crowley as his squad players and use coquelin cazorla ozil wilshire ramsey chamberlain as his main 6 for the 3 central midfield roles. That will leave him free to add another striker to his main 5 forwards alexis walcott giroud welbeck and wellington with gnabry iwobi and akpom his squad players that alone would give us 22 players fighting for 6 positions and only 6 of those would be classed as u21, meaning just 9 places left in the 25 man squad. You then start to see wenger’s predicament, he has to add 3 keepers and at least 8 defenders to those 16 and can just about do that because bellerin and chambers class as u21. So i am expecting just 2 signings a keeper (cech or casillas) meaning that Szczesney will be sold or loaned out. Plus a striker to replace podolski, I think it will be higuain, with campbell and sanogo also loaned or sold. Only if any of the 4 stooges (arteta, flamini, diaby and rosicky) get big money offers with guaranteed playing time will he replace them. So my anticipated 25 man squad with extra u21 players is
Cech, ospina, martinez macey (u21)
Debuchy bellerin (u21)
Koscielny mertesacker Gabriel chambers (u21) hayden (u21)
Monreal gibbs
Coquelin cazorla ozil wilshire ramsey chamberlain arteta flamini rosicky diaby zelalem (u21) Bielik (u21) crowley (u21)
Alexis walcott higuain giroud welbeck wellington gnabry (u21) Akpom (u21) iwobi (u21)
I expect jenkinson to go out on loan with Szczesney, podolski, sanogo and campbell also leaving on loan or permanently if deals can be done. As I said only if arteta, flamini, rosicky or diaby then depart do I expect another midfielder to come in. However, martinez is another that might go on loan which would free up another space in the squad.
When you look at the u21 players that we have there, you only need to add an u21 left back and you would have an awesome u21 team
I say just pay the 25 mil and get kondogbia, we are not getting Vidal for sure, so let’s just go to kondogbia. He is a classy DM with lots of energy and power just what we need right now.
We need someone to share the duties with lecoq not bench him. Someone like kondogbia or wanayama would be the ideal choice.
Keep doing the same thing, keep getting the same result! Wenger must understand that the footballing world has changed and therefore must stop these silly valuations of worthy players or he keeps being an also-ran! If you want the man, go pay and get him! Don’t start thinking that you can change the world by your stubbornness! Enough of this Mr Wenger!
Go get us Kondogbia, Cech and Martinez and the EPL is then yours to lose. Thank you.
That same thing that he is doing is the very same thing that lead the club to be in the position that it is in now. He said in an interview that “the club can’t make a meager 20£ and spend 40”, indeed he is correct. Be patient, we finally got some money to do a bit of business so let’s do it right as u can see he has done it with Ozil, Sanchez, Debuchy, Ospina and Chambers. We are just clearing our debts and began to see some revenue so we must spend it wisely and not just for the sake of spending.
We’ve been doing this forever. You mentioned Debuchy & Chambers, but are they playing regularly or are they for the future? If they are for the future where are those kids who were touted for the future but all we can presently see are the likes of Gibbs and Wilshere fulfilling those dreams. Are we sure we are not wasting so much money on mediocrity when we could be buying more of established players? Take a look at Podolski and you’ll begin to see where I’m coming from. As I said earlier, we must for this season buy Kondogbia/Vidal/Schneilderlin, Cech (world class) and Martinez and I’ll bet good money that we win the EPL. Please give us the long suffering fans something to smile about at last – the domestic EPL and perhaps the FA or Carling Cup. We can then begin to attract more quality and build from there. Buy therefore these 3 and get rid of at least 6 more where we are currently wasting a shed load of wages per week- Arteta, Flamini, Rosicky, one of the GKs, Abu Diaby (I believe he’s gone now- hallelujah) send out Gnabry, Zalalem and Akpom on loan if we are ever going to make use of their talents in the coming seasons. And what do we do with Wilko as we now have the exciting Bellarin and Debuchy in that position?
Manage your mind into constructive shape first dude. I saw some contradictions in your statement.
1) Sustainable development is what football clubs doing to make good resources of regeneration on their teams. It means they are always searching and scouting around the world for talented footballers. Those bunch of kids through “natural selection” will reduce into fewer number. We’ve Gibbs, Willshere, Coquelin, and Bellerin emerged from our youth academy. We still can gain same quality comes out from the like of Jenko, Akpom, Zelalem, Miyaichi, Campbell, or Crowley.
2) AW will spend big money for the right men only. Sanchez and Ozil as examples.
3) You didn’t feel the joy and happiness from our back to back FA Cup triumph? Or you just awaken from along time comma?
And we’ll keep waiting for our first trophy if it’s going to be one superstar per year. Coquelin was by luck as AW had given up on him way before the injuries struck. So his development in a way wasn’t systematic. We can’t afford to wait another 4-6 years before another youth player is discovered.
Can we make a rule? No stories based on the Metro as the source.
i wonder why we know the metro is shit ……yet we are still fed with silly rumours from their feeds!
Vidal and Cech and I am happy as a clam. Add a top rate striker to that and i will be forever in your debt Mr. Wenger.
seeing as this copa america might have the better of Sanchez…… And he might be given a few weeks rest…… Wenger may go on to buy a Reus-like or griezmann-like kinda player as cover:…….Anticipating to Transfer window anyways
In other news, Liverpool refuse selling stalling Sterling, he gets very angry and starts scoring tones of own goals…………….!!!!
No point in Wenger spending big on a dm when we have Coquelin. We just need a back up player for that position that doesn’t cost more than £15 Mil.
Wenger should be putting his attention on a World Class striker and Keeper. The fact that Sanchez(a winger) was our top scorer with 16 goals should be a major concern for Arsene.
We must have a 25+ a season Striker to even have a chance of winning the league.
“25+ a season striker” to even have a chance? You talking league goals? Nonsense. We have a potential front 3 who have all scored 20+ goals in all comps in a season. Plenty of ammo. The 2 PL top scorers last year won nada. Chelsea, Bayern and Juve won their leagues comfortably with their top striker not breaking 20. Many ways to skin that cat my friend.
Lets pay the £25m he can play for us for 10 years. Or kychrowiak would be legit and he’s older so Le coq can learn from him also
Wenger should put in a bid of 22 million pounds for him, i think that would be enough to convince Monaco. I think we need him urgently. If we think we are fully covered by Coq then it means we have not learn’t from our past mistakes. We need quality in depth for every position if we intend to win the EPL any time soon. I thought we all should have known this by now.