Don't Miss

[Photos] Cedric Soares poses in Arsenal shirt after completing deadline day move

By mac14 on January 31, 2020

Arsenal have announced the signing of Cedric Soares on an initial loan deal from Southampton with the full-back becoming our second signing of the January window.

News broke on Wednesday that Arsenal were set to sign the Portuguese international with the Telegraph one of several media outlets reporting we had agreed terms with Southampton. The paper says Arsenal will pay around £1m to land Soares on a six-month loan with a view to signing the right-back on a four-year deal in the summer.

Soares will be a free agent at the end of the season as his contract at Southampton will expire in six months, so this is a very sensible bit of business from Arsenal if we decide to sign him for nothing in June.

The 28-year-old has now completed his medical and agreed personal terms allowing Arsenal to announce the deal on Arsenal.com this morning, with the defender becoming Mikel Arteta’s second addition of the winter window following the arrival of Pablo Mari on loan from Flamengo.

Soares has played as a right-back for much of his career so he’s expected to be a dependable back-up for Hector Bellerin which will allow Ainsley Maitland-Niles to play further forward in midfield.

However, he’s also capable of playing as a left-back so I wouldn’t be surprised to see him filling-in at times with Sead Kolasinac and Kieran Tierney both having injury problems this season.

Soares arrives having played over 100 times for Southampton in the Premier League and has 33 caps for Portugal so he shouldn’t take much time to settle and has plenty of experience at the top level.

Arteta needed to strengthen his options in defence and while Soares and Mari may not be big-money signings, Arsenal have limited funds this month so we’ve done well to bring in a full-back and centre-back on initial loan deals.

Here’s another picture of Soares looking pleased as he signed his contract: