Aaron Ramsdale’s move away from Arsenal is now close to happening as Southampton steps up their interest in signing him.
The Saints have been searching for a goalkeeper all summer, with Ramsdale on their shortlist. However, earlier this week, they focused on a move for Feyenoord’s Justin Bijlow.
When Bijlow encountered issues during his medical and the transfer fell through, Southampton quickly turned their attention back to Ramsdale.
They are now showing serious interest, and transfer insider Fabrizio Romano reports that they have submitted a bid to both Arsenal and the goalkeeper.
Although the details of the offer, including the transfer fee and Ramsdale’s potential salary, have not been disclosed, Romano confirms that Southampton is now awaiting a response from both the Gunners and Ramsdale.
Just Arsenal Opinion
We still have a good chance to secure a move for Ramsdale, and the goalkeeper will also want to make this move.
It means he can no longer compete for titles or play European football, but it could guarantee that he will get game time this season and beyond, which is what he has craved for a long time.
We have a valuation for the Englishman, but we may have to lower it to help our efforts to offload him this summer.
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An agreement has apparently been reached at £18 million base and up to £7 million performance based add-ons.
I believe the following I posted on July 16 still holds true:
For the saints the deal could be easily worth many times that cost if it means the difference between staying in the PL and going down again, which imo is very possible as Ramsdale can be that much of a difference maker. Look at what Pickford has done for Everton in the past. From Ramsdale’s perspective, he must play somewhere now and starting for any premier league club is sufficient for what he needs to showcase.
Good luck Aaron!
I think you have summed it up very well BB
Thanks Sue. All’s well that ends well I hope.
Sad to see him leave, but happy that he will get games, he deserves it.
Mercy, I just realized how difficult it’s going to be to watch several of the PL games this season.
18 million lol
He was worth triple that 12 months ago .
Now we are about to bid 30 million on another keeper .
What a complete waste of funds .
The way we value and sell our player is highly ridiculous, look at this an English boy for God sake.
I so much envy Liverpool the way they handle their transfer especially the out going players.
Does seem rather low even with the add ons going up to 25 mil and I’m wondering with these cheap sales and our dithering on the buying side that there is something going on behind the scenes we know nothing about! But, if we buy a replacement for for more money, that doesn’t make sense. I’m wondering if we will go back to Wolves with an improved offer over the 1 million(?) we offered earlier in the window. Anyway, best of luck Aaron.
GB, I sincerely hope we don’t go for that Wolves keeper. I saw him in a pre-season friendly and he looked terrible. Garcia from Espanyol is the one we’re supposedly close to replacing Ramsdale with.
Here we go……sigh 😔😔
Crazy absolutely crazy plus we send our No. 3 keeper out on loan, so have to buy another keeper.
Absolute insanity – imagine if Raya gets injured against Brighton!!!!
Ken, I would say that there is no way the club would sell Ramsdale without having another keeper lined up.
We are obviously not going to get a top class keeper to join us who is prepared to be a number 2 to Raya and play the occasional game so why didn’t we keep Hein who at least has some international experience and we wouldn’t now be scrabbling around looking for a keeper to buy and using up funds that would be better spent elsewhere.
Well if Garcia signs we will have a keeper who has just won Gold at the Olympics for Spain.
Selling Ramsdale for anything lower than £30m is a big fail on Arteta as the prime failure and Edu for letting this happen. Just over a year ago Ramsdale was rated as the most expensive goalkeeper at £55m after the 2022/23 Season with age and form the two most important criteria for the rating. I’ve mostly praised Arteta and Edu, but this is one they could have handled better especially Arteta who knew fully well he was going to choose Raya over Ramsdale, but they chose to handle it poorly as there is no conceivable reason, no excuse whatsoever for such a mess coming from two professionals. If it were possible, any loss from Ramsdale’s deal should be paid for from both their salaries.
Prices change yearly Solwills. Like anything that’s up for sale, you can only get what someone is willing to pay.
This has nothing to do with price change but poor management. His drop in value was not because of price change, or because he suddenly bacame bad, but because he got dropped Ramsdale’s situation was poor management, he should have been put in the market and sold last season.
I have no problem with dropping Ramsdale but how Edu and Arteta especially handled the situation knowing well he would be dropped and the effects on his value. Well, it’s not my money.
It is difficult to see how Arsenal could have put Ramsdale up for sale last season.
Not true David as it was not difficult, Arteta just didn’t handle it well, and Edu let him. There are a couple of ways this would have been handled well.
1) Clarity from the start of the season, put Ramsdale up for sale. Several clubs signed new goalkeepers last season for big money.
2) Give him more minutes, especially in the Champions League or at least all the group stage games, just like Barcelona did with Bravo and Ter Stegen (Barcelona got £8m for Bravo at the end of that season even though he was well into his 30s with 1 year left. Arteta always knew Raya would be his number 1 hence his debut in the game just before Champions League Day 1.
Solwills,
At which point last season would you have sold Ramsdale?
He started the season and shortly got dropped in favour of Raya, so the January transfer window would have been the only option, so in effect, this is the first opportunity to “move him on”
I think if we are really being honest with ourselves, it suited Arsenal and as an Arsenal supporter, I take a hard line when it comes to not being overly soft on who stays and who goes. It is still a bone of contention for those who think that Ramsdale is a better goalie and as we all do from time to time, make excuses for those players we think better fit the bill. His chance to make Arteta lose sleep resulted in a costly error which which didn’t help his cause. I recall Martinez coming on for the injured Leno, and he absolutely nailed it. Ramsdale really needed to do the same and didn’t stake his claim to retain the number 1 jersey.
Where I agree with numerous posts, is the lack of any meaningful rotation. In Raya’s case, he needed to play in the CL and prem, and unfortunately, our domestic cups didn’t amount to much, but Ramsdale certainly deserved a start in those.
Real talk SueP 👍
Sue, at the start of the season. My reply to David explains better my thoughts. This whole saga was so confusing to all of us fans and even the media but perhaps not to Arteta, so him been honest to Ramsdale would have brought clarity to all including Ramsdale. I refused to judge as I always do until I see the end, and this hasn’t ended well financially for Arsenal and with Arteta especially, and Edu lies blame, both of whom if you have been following my post I have mostly backed but not this time. This is not to say they haven’t done better at other times.
Solwills
I mentioned being honest with ourselves for good reason and I think that Ramsdale’s sunny disposition has affected our thinking but it shouldn’t as the continued improvement of the club is paramount
Whether Arteta believed his own comments about rotating both keepers (see Ken1945’s comments below) is debatable but the fact is that Ramsdale started the early games. For Ramsdale to have been sold when you suggested would have meant putting him up for sale during the summer transfer window last year and starting Raya off from scratch as the number 1 – a loanee with no obligation to buy. Whilst there seems to be a common held view that Raya was Arteta’s choice, I’m not so convinced he knew which player would be – hence the talk of rotation. Turner wasn’t the answer and a better goalkeeping option for the season was required to challenge in the CL and the league. I felt that so much effort had been put into getting the league victory that to have relied on Turner if Ramsdale got injured could have been catastrophic
Ramsdale has been a victim of circumstance but looks to be getting game time.
The comment about rotating has been taken out of context and is consistently being used by some as an argumentative point to question the integrity of Arteta. For those people we should ignore what Arteta said and the realities of the situation which you have outlined.
People regularly ignore the fact that Ramsdale started the season and as you say it was unclear who would be first choice.
From my perspective it would have made no sense to put Ramsdale up for sale during last summer’s transfer window.
Solwills
Ramsdale’s disposition and my love for him has nothing to do with my argument as I have never been against Raya as number one, I’ve questioned sometimes whenever Raya made mistakes, but I’ve always backed Arteta with Raya. I’m more concerned about how the handing of the situation has cost the club financially. That has been my argument.
That’s an interesting point Solwills Isn’t it a known fact that Arteta had his eye on Raya but was unable to move for him? Enter Ramsdale who hadn’t ever played at a big club, getting the first team GK job at Arsenal until Raya was available. He now looks to be going back to Southampton where his prospects are less certain at a similar price to what we paid for him. It’s a rum do
And what makes you think we would have got more money for him last season, remember we only had Raya on loan ? If we did sell him last season, which keeper would have replaced him ?
Because clubs were in need of and bought top goals keepers in form last season for big money. With Ramsdale’s form at the end of the previous season he most probably would have been one them, our neighbors Tottenham got Vicarious, Chelsea bought Sanchez and would have gladly paid big money for Ramsdale, M. United Onana and many more. We would have kept Turner as second choice.
Not sure if you know the history of transfers between us and that lot from N17, but there’s more chance of seeing Hayley’s Comet then them buying a player from us. Also they bought their present keeper for a lot less than Southampton are paying us for Ramsdale.
Yes Onana went for a lot of money, but their manager wanted him, as he had played for him at Ajax.
So you know that Chelsea would’ve “gladly paid big money for Ramsdale” ? Strange then that they never came in for him.
Turner, not a bad keeper, but even Forest have signed another keeper to replace him.
Your reply is one of the reasons I dislike certain arguments and see them as futile but muscle our brains as the only benefit because, we often shift the goal post just like you have now. Also twice now in response to my comments you have ‘asked how do you know?’ and ‘So you know?’ Well, then I guess you have never asked for the expected outcome of something yet to happen before in your life, and even if you do, when they answer, you ask them the same questions you’ve asked me twice. And, maybe, when we discuss our future matches and you or anyone criticize the coach for fielding a weak team as the reason for our loss against a league one team, with your opinions or reasons quite valid, the reply to argue against your points should be, ‘how do you know we would have won with a stronger formation?’
What you class as an argument I class as a discussion. You posted at 12:32 yesterday that “Chelsea bought Sanchez and would have gladly paid big money for Ramsdale”. So you made an assumption then ?
I’ll leave it there, as I don’t want to upset you anymore than you already are.
All these transfers happened before we completed deal for Raya. Raya deal was completed late in the transfer window hence little time for the club to react.
Well, another player we have devalued. Ramsdale is worth far more than that in real terms but yet again we have done a bad deal. We devalue players more than any other team.
£25mil and a potential sell-on not bad for a second choice GK for me. Remember in these negotiations there’s a player side we have to consider, he needed to play and was probably pushing for an exit and we need to respect that. I believe that could be a factor why some players choose Arsenal over other teams it’s respect. Just look at how Chelsea just sidelines their unwanted players? For instance Sterling no class
Oyama, do you think the way we have treated Ramsdale has shown “real class?”
Saying that he wanted to rotate his keepers, by substituting them during games and then point blank refusing to do so, even when we were leading by a hatfull of goals – was that “respecting” the player?
Your comment about him being a second choice keeper doesn’t sound respectful, especially to a player who has done nothing wrong, handled himself in a professional manner and hasn’t dissed the club at any time.
I understand that MA has made the decision that Raya is his number one keeper, just as he decided Leno was before him and then let Martinez go for around the same transfer fee as is being reported for Ramsdale.
I’m afraid you can’t start citing chelsea and their behaviour, while not acknowledging that we have done the same thing… but covering it by saying Arteta is being ruthless… and his treatment of Ramsdale is one example.
Correct Ken.
@Ken, how is saying Ramsdale was second choice not respectful ? Look man at times in football its not about what you’re not doing wrong, but about what you’re not doing right (the expectations of the coach)
My comparison with Chelsea was the fact that they didn’t allow about 13 that were not part of the coaches plan to train with 1st team. At least Ramsdale was allowed.
I’ve said before that the goalkeeping situation at Arsenal was a bit of a mess due to Arteta and Edu. But I still believe they did right and shown class by allowing him to move on though the demands were not met and still needed to bring some replacement in less than 48hrs. They did show some respect in that regard.
Lastly I remember very well that interview with Arteta and he was suggesting he would rotate and play everyone and he didn’t do that. It was not specifically Ramsdale only. He also said in the past he had wanted to substitute goalkeepers because they were not performing and he couldn’t because he was not brave enough. But suggested if the keeper was not performing he would be able to do so with the quality of Ramsdale and Raya.
The quote
“I haven’t had a single question on why Gabriel Jesus didn’t start. He has won more trophies than anybody else, including me, in that dressing room. I cannot have two players in each position and not play them. David has tremendous qualities, like Aaron has, like Karl (Hein) has and we have to use them.”
Ken1945
Would you take the same attitude with the outfield players who get dropped in favour of another? I agree that Ramsdale hasn’t done anything obviously wrong but that in itself isn’t enough to get the jersey. It’s the world of high level football and I want Arsenal to win over and above stressing over Raya ousting Ramsdale. AR didn’t or was unable to rise to the challenge. Hard lines for him, of course.
It’s almost liked he lied when he said that
@Dan I think he made promises that were difficult to keep for whatever reasons, but it was not just Ramsdale only but also others. He’s still a young manager hopefully he’s learned from that, he needs to watch what he says in media.
Not seen anywhere a sell on clause?
@Reggie yes I’ve seen in the news and apparently it’s significant sell-on.
There’s definitely something back to front in our buying and selling dept.
I think a move to Southampton would be a very risky career move for Ramsdale. He will more than likely be in a relegation battle this year and could end up in the championship next season. I would advise him to bide his time at Arsenal as no2. I am pretty sure he will get more game time in the Cups this season and who knows if Raya gets injured he is in the team. He is young and good enough to wait for a better move than this one.
👍
It’s OK saying wait for a better move but there wasn’t too much interest now and after another season as a back-up keeper there probably wouldn’t be more next summer.
Ramsdale needs regular first team football and he just wasn’t getting that anymore at Arsenal. Good luck to him.
👍
Good news for Arsenal and Ramsdale in my opinion. A sale was always the better option than a reported loan and Ajax was never a realistic alternative.
I’m pleased for Ramsdale as he’ll be able to pursue his ambitions at both a club and, hopefully, international level now.
Edu nailing this transfer window so far, just Tierney to go, and Nelson if a winger is signed in 38 hours
@1886 I think this has to be his best work so far at Arsenal. With the future looking bright, he’s buying ready-made players now and also at the same time shipping out all the players who didn’t make grade last season.
Hopefully he’s able to move on Reis and bring in an upgrade/ top class forward
Selling Tierney would really be the icing on Edu’s transfer cake. Given we’re talking about a player who has injury problems that make the ones Jesus has look inconsequential, I think it will be a brave club that puts any “reasonable” sum of money on the table for him. I’m not saying it couldn’t happen, but I doubt it somehow.
If there are no takers at all, even for a loan, I wouldn’t be surprised if Arsenal suggested a contract cancellation to Tierney. Then, as a free agent, he could see what comes up (without any transfer fee considerations). It would get his wages off the books at least.
Wow he is selling 40M worth player in less than 20M and getting praise for it.