AbsolutelyOriginally Posted by Cripps
Except Welbeck of course
Absolutely
Except Welbeck of course
Isn't Chiellini out of contract too? Why wouldn't we be trying to bring him here first!?
Emil Forsberg for 50 mill?
Why would we need him? Unless one from Laca, Ozil or Mikki are heading out.
Für eure Sicherheit
NOTE: The location of this post has been moved and the thread title (which was previously Wenger is Leaving) has been manipulated by a notorious pro-Wenger moderator. What was previously a message that contained no profanity and made a comment on a real life event has now been manipulated by a deliberately provocative title. An old and crude propaganda and censorship technique.
So crates!
Arsenal are close to signing centre-back Sokratis Papastathopoulos from Borussia Dortmund for a reported £16m.
The 29-year-old Greece international has a year left on his contract with the German Bundesliga side.
It is the latest step in Arsenal's drive to rebuild their defence with experience and leadership.
The Gunners are also working on a deal to sign Switzerland right-back Stephan Lichtsteiner, 34, on a free transfer from Juventus.
The Premier League club intend to bolster their squad with signings who are immediately ready for first-team football and, over time, continue to recruit younger players for the medium to long term.
An example is Papastathopoulos' countryman Konstantinos Mavropanos, 20, who joined in January and was the first signing overseen by new head of recruitment Sven Mislintat, formerly chief scout at Dortmund.
That month Arsenal also brought in Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang from Dortmund and Henrikh Mkhitaryan - yet another ex-Dortmund player.
Former Genoa and AC Milan defender Papastathopoulos continues the trend and will help compensate for the loss of captain Laurent Koscienly to an Achilles injury.
The departure of manager Arsene Wenger and arrival of head coach Unai Emery has seen Arsenal adopt a continental model in which Mislintat will lead on recruitment alongside Emery, head of football relations Raul Sanllehi and chief executive Ivan Gazidis.
Emery will contribute to the decision-making process and retain power of veto, while it is understood proposed signings were discussed with head coach candidates during the interview stage.
We are going to have to reduce the font we use on the players names at the back of the shirts. Those Greek names are long.
Make 2mrw better than 2day
We're going to have the oldest defence in the world at this rate. Read a bit about Sokratis and it seems he's been really poor in the last couple seasons, not too sure about this signing.
As someone said Chiellini may well be available on a free if someone made him a decent offer, top class player and if we're going to go for ageing players he'd be the kind of player we should look at.
I'm ok with the Lichtsteiner deal as he's just a bit of experienced back up.
Bit underwhelmed by Papastathopoulos though, think we need to push the boat out and sign a top class CB.
I mentioned Chiellini.
I don't get the need to sign a load of mid range players. I don't even recall how good either of them are, but seriously aren't we supposed to be trying to reach another level? The Juve guy fair enough if he's out of contract but this Sokratis guy?
I know Arsenal aren't going to sign him but if money really is tight I'd rather we spunked 60-80 million on a truly world class keeper in Oblak, offered Chiellini and Iniesta offers they cannot refuse (I think Iniesta has agreed on a Japan team though now) then try and bring in Dembele of Barca on loan. Then use the funds of next year January/Summer to sign another world class player. We aren't going to make up the difference with average players rotating in for some of the average we already have.
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