The Arsenal and Spain international star midfielder Santi Cazorla has been the subject of a growing anumber of Arsenal transfer rumours over the last few weeks, ever since the reports began about La Liga´s Atletico Madrid being set to sell their own attacking midfielder Arda Turan.
The Turkish international had been strongly linked with a move to the Premier League with two of our rivals, Chelsea and Man United, said to be in the running. So there was a good chance that not only would one of the clubs most likely to challenge us for the title have a top talent added to their ranks, but the Gunners might be losing one of our best and most influential players.
Now the Spanish La Liga and Champions League holders Barcelona have announced that they have completed the transfer of Turan, as reported by ESPN, so what does this mean for Arsenal. Well even though Atletico are now richer by around £25 million, it does not necessarily mean that we will soon be getting a big offer for Cazorla.
For one thing, the Catalan club are still under a transfer ban which means that Turan cannot play for them until January and so will probably play the first of of the season with his former club and that could mean that Atletico wait until then to sign a replacement. Now if Arsene Wenger and the players can get us into a position to challenge for the BPL title, then it should be easy to persuade the little Spaniard to stay.
If we are way behind the leaders by then, however, could that mean that Cazorla will be packing his bags?