20 days of this
transfer window has passed and we are now 12 days away from deadline as the
shutdown will happen on 2nd Feb this time. And we are yet do some
serious business by acquiring a defender who will help us to save the season
and win some silverware with his presence. Our defense is in dire need of strengthening
as pointed out in this earlier post.
And the names linked
till date are AS Saint-Ettienne’s Loic Perrin, Villarreal’s Gabriel Paulista,
Winston Reid from West Ham and Celtic’s Virgil van Dijk.
In the early days of January, 29 year old Loic Perrin was a hot topic as the
player confirmed about contact from Arsenal. Since then, Gunners went cold
about it and now it remains to be seen if the interest ignites again in case we
don’t get our preferred target which I suppose is Gabriel Paulista at the moment.
The 26 year old Brazilian valued at €20mn,
like Perrin, also confirmed about the contact from the Arsenal. He is a regular
in the team which is on an unbeaten run in La Liga since the beginning of the November.
But there a few stumbling blocks for this move to happen. Firstly the asking
price and then work permit issue. Since he’s never been capped by Brazil, he is
not qualified in that regard Nor he has an EU passport as he only moved to
Europe in 2015. But Arsenal believe it can be resolved and if asked then they
can offer Joel Campbell as a makeweight to make this deal happen who has only
played a bit-part role. If it happens then, its good for the player as he may
get more game time there.
Now moving on to Winston Reid, the hammers has slapped price tag of £8mn. But
there’s one good thing in this saga. Arsenal loanee Jenkinson has impressed
them in this stint and they want to make his move permanent. Quickly sensing
this opportunity, English right full back’s valuation has been declared worth £12mn. So it remains to be seen whether this deal pane-out or just fell through.
Regarding Virgil van Dijk, there is nothing concrete besides media reports
linking him everywhere. So I don’t think there is any chance of it happening.
Finally some news about outgoing player. Young
defender Semi Ajayi will reportedly
join Sunderland on permanent basis. Joining from Charlton Athletic last season,
he failed to make an appearance for the first team but was on bench for a few
games. He is out of Contract in June so cashing on will be a good choice.
And some more bad news now. Isaac Hayden has had a surgery on his
ankle a day ago and is expected to be out for long. He made his only appearance
this season in the League cup loss against Southampton. Let’s hope we don’t face
a situation where we miss him.
Will be back tomorrow.
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