Arsenal interested in swooping in for Sweden international
According to Sport Witness, Arsenal’s technical director Edu wants to bring in Bologna’s Mattias Svanberg to the Emirates Stadium.
With Thomas Partey set to depart for AFCON alongside Mohamed Elneny, the Gunners will be short of midfield reinforcements.
Although they have Granit Xhaka and Albert Sambi Lokonga, the failure of having a decent backup to them is the real problem.
Despite being a half decent option, Ainsley Maitland-Niles is not someone you can trust at the middle of the park.
This is where Svanberg can come in. The Sweden international, despite being 22, has already played more than 150 senior matches.
He is the very fabric of the player the Gunners staff acquired last summer: young but with plenty of experience.
With the midfielder’s contract set to expire in 2023, the North London outfit can acquire his services on a cut-price deal.
When compared to Xhaka, Svanberg contributes more in the final third. His expected goals (xG) and expected assists (xA) are superior to that of the Swiss international. 0.08, 0.12 to 0.07, 0.08.
Other than the attacking stats, Xhaka has fared better than his counterpart.
If Arsenal want Xhaka to operate as a deep-lying midfielder and Svanberg as more of a number eight, then this deal seems rational.
Despite not being much defensively active, the young midfielder can certainly improve on that aspect.
Given his age, he has loads of time to hone his skills too.
Writer’s view: If the transfer fee is not high, I won’t have any problem with Svanberg trading Bologna for London.
Arsenal have earlier done business with the Italian side for a certain Japanese defender. He didn’t turn out to be too bad!
That could certainly be said of the Swede in a few months’ time.