Morning all.
Ezra Konsa is set to sign for Arsenal then after the Premier League champions and Aston Villa finally agreed on a transfer fee yesterday. What he’s done at Villa or with England is kind of irrelevant I think because what is more important is how he fits into an Arsenal back four and how he performs. He’s a good player, there’s no doubting that but at 28 years old, now is his time to show he can be a great player.
This signing, like Bruno Guimaraes, is a sign of Arsenal thinking of now rather than the long term. Both players still have a good few years at the top left in them of course so it’s not like we’ve signed players who are already in decline, these two are in their peak years.
The long term thoughts have not been abandoned though as the club has been signing younger players too during this transfer window. Elijah Upson joined us from the nasty neighbours, Mylo Bernard and Vincent Joseph from Crystal Palace and Liverpool respectively and a deal has been agreed to bring in Axel Donczew from Cardiff City. (The Athletic) Arsenal are also trying to complete the signings of Manchester United academy players James Scanlon and Habeeb Ogunneye. Blackburn striker Igor Tyjon is very close to making his move to the club too. This time next year, Edwin and Holger Quintero will make their move to the club. So yes, the future is being looked after as far as potential goes.
Back to Ezri Konsa though, he’s a buy one get one free kind of player because like Cristhian Mosquera, he’s a centre back who is more than capable of playing at right back which is perfect really. Jurrien Timber remains on the sidelines, Ben White has already played a lot in pre-season which is great but slightly concerning with his recent injury problems and William Saliba, well who knows when he’ll return.
Arsenal and injuries are never far apart are they? Riccardo Calafiori is another player who can regularly miss a few games through injury which in my opinion is another good reason to keep Myles Lewis-Skelly. He’s excelling in midfield but I can foresee him being required to drop in at left back at some stage of the season. An injury to Gabriel and that time might come sooner rather than later.
I’ve no idea what Arsenal plan to do between now and September 1st when the transfer window closes but the media expect an attacking player to come in. Rogers was on that list apparently as was/is Bradley Barcola and Julian Alvarez, not to mention our links to Vinicius Jr. But if a forward player does arrive at the club, it’s likely to spell the end of Gabriel Martinelli’s career at Arsenal although I’d rather our backup right winger left before Martinelli, especially as the latter is more than capable of playing on the right and he offers a lot more defensively than Madueke. A lot more but I guess out of the two, Martinelli is more saleable, especially after his World Cup goal for Brazil which was a peach.
Talking of sales, Arsenal really need to start selling because Gabriel Jesus, Fabio Vieira and Reiss Nelson are filling up squad places when it’s pretty obvious they are not going to get playing time this coming season.
Catch up later.
Ditto re the transfer window. Roll on the 2nd of September.
Morning all.
I’m glad Alvarez has rejected us, if true of course. If he wasn’t right for City, why would we want him. Plus, I think the Argentina players in the PL are in for a rough time this season.
New day, new season, and a new post….
Despite bringing the rumours to the house I do wonder about where they are coming from . Do we really want Alvarez because he has made it quite clear that he doesn’t want us . Everything that he has said is he wants to go to Barcelona , and this morning the media are saying that we have offered Atletico 65 million and Gyokeres ..
Say that this is true , and lets imagine that Alverez says no where does that leave big Vic ?
The same goes for Martinelli , Vinicius , now Yildiz ,
Two good players that both want to stay being forced to leave for players that openly have said no to us in the past.
Who is spreading all of this ? One thing that was paramount under David Dein was that negotiation were always in house and players came and went without acrimony .
I will be glad when the transfer window is over , in fact I would be glad if the whole system was abandoned and it went back to discussions between clubs .
At the risk of offending Merlin, Inter Milan have expressed an interest in signing Gabriel Martinelli, which I hope is fake news.
Oh! and we are in for Juventus forward Kenan Yildiz.
Merlin it’s one way of getting amusement from the rumours abounding. Kind of a form of catharsis
Hello fellow Gooners.
I have mixed feelings on the Ezra Konsa signing, a bit pricey, though he is home-grown. It helps of course that he’s an Arsenal fan (I think he is), it will sharpen his focus and help his integration.
Away from transfer speculation, the real stuff starts tonight.
Even though he should be having a few weeks rest, something tells me Declan Rice will start.
My predicted XI:
Raya
White
Mosquera (if Konsa isn’t registered in t
time)
Gabriel
Califiori
Rice
MLS
Odegaard
Saka
Tzolis
Havertz.
I’m hoping for a comfortable 2 or 3-0, with Gyokeres off the bench to score against his former club.
Let’s enjoy tomorrow game and stop speculating click-baits of transfers.
Goodnight all.
So, we can’t take the best in the premier league but it’s ok for City and Liverpool to take the best from the world,
Maybe take 40 mill with 10 mill add on’s and sell on bonus
Good evening Rico and all
Potter, that go fund me comment cracked me up. Kev, the fake comment spoiled it. grrrrr. I was holding my breath
I enjoyed reading the post Rico. Much better info than what you find on NN
So…..First we went to Brentford and took their best keeper.
Then we went to WHU and took their captain and best midfielder
Then we went to NUFC and did the same to them as we did to WHU
Now we went to villa and took their best player.
We might go to City and take Haaland.
Fingers crossed.
And it seems that Carragher has complained that Arsenal are taking the best EPL players from clubs.
Those pundits seem to make Arteta’s job easier.
Apparently Potter that Madueke rumour was a fake, which means I’ve already upset my boys as they can’t stand him… 🙄
🤣🤣
I saw on one site that people were opening a go fund me site for Forest to raise the difference.We could always have a whip round .Kev will you drive the taxi ?
Yep, we’ll need Ethan.
Arteta was asked in press conference ahead of Friday night’s Premier League opener against Coventry – live on Sky Sports – if he is confident that Lewis-Skelly will remain as an Arsenal player,
He replied: “100 per cent.”
He later added: “The players that have been raised in our [academy] system and they feel that love and connection with the club, it brings something else. There is no question about that.
All the more reason to keep Nwaneri in house
I was going with the £60m..
If they do that we might be able to sell him to Barcelona?
£40,000,000+1 would be acceptable to me.😉
On 18 July 2025, Madueke was announced as an Arsenal player,[31] signing a five-year contract for a reported initial fee of £48.5 million, rising to £52 million with add-ons.
Wikipedia
Interest in Madueke is welcome but £40m isn’t quite enough from a Forest club who always sell high.
Room for manoeuvre methinks.
A big fat yes from me…
Nottingham Forest have submitted an official £40m bid to Arsenal for Noni Madueke. Understand Arsenal have immediately rejected the proposal. The Gunners have made their stance clear: they will only accept a £60m fee to let the winger go.
Would you accept that deal to happen??
Apparently
Don’t know anything about Konsa, but surly he has to be good if he is picked to represent England. and hopefully not just a panic buy as we seem to be missing out on some of the defenders the media claim Arteta is after.
Thanks Cicero..
I don’t get the desire to sell Martinelli either, seems a strange one to me.
I hope so no14, we need them gone..
Konsa strikes me as an ok signing born out of necessity rather than desire., the thing that keeps baffling me is the clamour for a replacement to Martinelli . I can’t help wondering if the whole thing is like a snowball rolling down a hill growing larger as the journey gets longer.
Is his agent the same as Jesus ‘ ? because he is definitely working towards our past record of discarding the unwanted so that a signing on fee in Italy can make up for the wage reduction.
We have previous and agents know it .
Last season we won the league with Trossard and Martinelli sharing the position , Trossard has gone and we have Tzolis so why change both ? materially nothing has changed.
We keep apparently offering our Brazillians to Turkish clubs but a quick question on google tells us that there are no Brazillian internationals playing there, for whatever reason the Turkish league doesn’t appeal to them and to the recently married Martinelli would he prefer to be with other Brazillians in Hertfordshire or on his own in Istanbul ?
We are now being linked with Yildiz from Juventus for 100 million euros , apparently we are offering Martinelli plus cash.
Between 2022 -2026 he has played 112 games for them and scored 21 goals, however in the same periodMartinelli for us has played 124 games and scored 30 goals.
So again I ask why ?
I’ll now read your new post.
We’ve always had B T broadband Rico, never had a problem with it. Our new B T/ E E box all installed but Sky sports not available for twenty four hours. I’m likely chuck the whole lot out the window if I can’t watch tomorrow night’s game.
I can understand why there are so many concerns about players that do not or hardly contribute to the first team while still being on the salary budget.
I would like to think that there is a taylor made plan for each of them to leave. These plans coincide with the important last week of the transfer window when clubs need to buy to fill up positions and would like to spend more.
As we know, Arsenal pay well which also makes it more difficult to sell players for the price you value them. I think we should trust Berta to solve this and not listen to what media say. I only hope that they reach their objectives so we can enjoy watching the new Invincibles.
Thanks Kev, I think we’re a lot stronger and like you, if the TW shut today, I’d be happy. Keeping players fit will be a huge bonus if we can manage it.
Morning Andrew, Kev, all.
I’m glad we’ve got Konsa in a way, he does what it says on the tin. A younger player might have been better but for the here and now which is what we need, Konsa should be fine.
Nice post Rico and yes that was an encouraging list of young signings, for too long our academy relied on the players they could source in the London and SE England area and that hasn’t in general been beneficial despite some sparkling successes among some pretty average squads. There’s a reason Arsenal have struggled to generate any funds from our academy lads and that probably because they’re not very good, we’ve earned more from sell-on clauses.
Arsenal definitely needed a defender, that’s obvious as we don’t really know when Saliba will be back and we also don’t know how resilient Timber will be when he eventually comes back so we needed someone ready made and at 28 Konsa is ready made and for the here and now!
I’ve never really been a massive Ezri Konsa fan, he’s always struck me as error strewn, but he had an impressive World Cup and would have certainly developed under the coaching of Unai Emery, so he’s currently at his peak.
£51m or £58m (probably after add-ons) seems £10 to £15m more than I think he’s worth, but the club have acted decisively – whatever anybody thinks – and have not penny-pinched so kudos to the ownership.
Now is that enough, is that a good window, are we stronger than 12 months ago?
Well, I’d be content if that was the end spending wise, I’d be very happy to see Martinelli stay and Myles of course. I don’t really want to see Zubimendi or Gyokeres leave and if Jesus, as seems the case, is set on playing out his last year, then fine, if we can fit him in?
Nelson will leave, Vieira will eventually leave, Arsenal will come to an arrangement with West Ham and Hamburg, I would also like to see Kepa sold.
So for me it’s been a good window and yes I think we’re stronger than we were 12 months ago. Of course a last minute Hincapie type deal for say Hinshelwood wouldn’t be a bad thing as long as we can fit him in…
Morning rico, all. Think Konsa is a sound signing, if not the glamourous left winger we might be hoping for. Many say promote Marli, or use Mosquira, but away at Villa, home to Chelsea, think Konsa be good. And I worry how bad Saliba is? If we had an injury to Gabriel without re-inforcing till January, we would sureky suffer.
PS – still not had my Friendlies refund, have you rico? Wondering if I did order through App rather than website, but its not in list of available refunds