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Arsenal Failed With €16m Midfielder Bid On Deadline Day

By mac14 on September 2, 2014

Reports in Portugal claim that Arsenal failed with a late bid to try and land Sporting Lisbon midfielder William Carvalho on transfer deadline day.

Fans were crying out for Arsene Wenger to bring in a powerful defensive midfielder and Carvalho was touted a key target throughout the summer.

It appears we finally made our move on deadline day with Portuguese paper Abola claiming that we offered €16m plus Joel Campbell for the 22-year-old.

However, Sporting Lisbon rejected the bid and insisted on a straight cash deal worth €30m, but Arsenal refused to stretch that far and we missed out.

The deal was complicated by third party ownership with an investment fund believed to own 40% of Carvalho’s economic rights, but I don’t think there’s any excuse for us not bringing in a defensive midfielder this summer.

If Carvalho was our No.1 target, then we should have moved for him weeks ago. He was available for €30m all August after Lisbon reduced the asking price and with Carvalho also capable of playing at centre-back, his signing would be filled two troublesome positions.

We could have sold Joel Campbell to Benfica for around €12m yesterday and if we add that to the €16m we were prepared to stump up in cash for Carvalho, we were just €2m short of Lisbon’s valuation.

Easier said than done I know, but this strikes me of a desperate late bid instead of the manager having a clear plan. With Welbeck signed, Campbell is going to have limited playing time so why not sacrifice him by selling him to Benfica in order to land a player who would have made a HUGE difference to the first team?

Even without selling Campbell, we easily have enough funds to buy Carvalho for €30m, so why not just get the deal done and give us a balanced squad that capable of challenging for the league. It’s sheer madness and I fear our failure to sign a defensive midfielder and/or centre-back is going to cost us this season.

8 Comments

bonaroca

September 2, 2014 at 4:10 pm

bonaroca :- Mr Wenger had the necessary funds and a full month to go after Carvalho when he should have known better like all the terraced supporters that Arsenal needed a Central midfielder.
The previous matches before the Leicester City match clearly showed were the main deficiency was and so he should have acted accordingly at all cost.
It seems to me that Arsenal’s CEO or the board are more interested making money out of the loyal supporters. If these people are not capable of rising to their responsibilities then they should resign.

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LOLpundit

September 2, 2014 at 4:32 pm

I am sure Arsenal would have thought about it if they were serious.

http://lolpundit.wordpress.com/2014/09/02/danny-welbeck-replaces-the-greatest-striker-on-planet/

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Gideon Agbebi

September 2, 2014 at 4:43 pm

I have said it times without number that Mr Wenger used to handle Arsenal FC as personal property.100M pounds was given to him but could not spend it on all the needed players to prosecute this season competitions. When you are too wise u become fool in the sight of all observers.

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lucas

September 2, 2014 at 10:05 pm

I don’t know how you guy get your informations from about money available to Wenger(£100m), this fund’s never available in reality. Get it straight, we expect to much from wenger/ Arsenal..we can’t pull string the way Manu,chelsea, city,madrid..Arsenal’s not as big as you think.

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Sam

September 2, 2014 at 11:46 pm

lucas must be a chease fan, so he didnt want the best for Arsenal, imagine evaton having the likes of lukaku,Eto, Nasmith, Miralas without breakin the bank. remy cost only 8m,Rabiot of psg 8m,Fabrigas would have cost us around 20, Vela 3m,Eto’o,free, Song 8 or loan, kedirah 10,Negredo,loan.
all this are within any top4’s range so stop defending the outdated coach. He should leave now.

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lucas

September 3, 2014 at 10:29 am

All those players ya mentioned are ok…..truth be told must arsenal sign every player….most arsenal fans are not better than the english papers..they link every player on earth to Arsenal and they want him to sign them all. wenger sign…sign and sign…we all know wenger too well. Am not surprised at all am only disappointed that we ended up nat signing a defensive midfielder.
Am a true gunner!!

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Holyman

September 3, 2014 at 2:26 pm

It’s a pity that Arsene Wenger started well in the transfer window but ended up not giving the much needed player to fill the vacuum at Arsenal.

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